Preamble

The House met at a quarter before Three of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

Irwell Valley Water Board Bill,

Order for Consideration of Lords Amendments read.

Motion made, and Question, "That the Lords Amendments be now considered," put, and agreed to.

Lords Amendments considered accordingly.

The Chairman of Ways and Means (Sir Dennis Herbert): All the Amendments are of a drafting nature.

Lords Amendments agreed to.

Manchester Corporation Bill [Lords],

Plymouth Extension Bill [Lords],

Wakefield Corporation Bill [Lords],

Read the Third time, and passed, with Amendments.

Land Drainage Provisional Order (Louth Drainage District) Bill (by Order).

Second Reading deferred till Monday next.

BRITISH MUSEUM.

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sir Samuel Hoare): I have been asked by the Trustees of the British Museum to present a petition which they have to submit to this House annually, explaining the financial position and praying for aid. The petition recites the funded income of the Trustees and points out that the establishment is necessarily attended with an expense far beyond the annual production of the funds, and the trust cannot with benefit to the public be carried on without the aid of Parliament. It concludes with this prayer:
Your petitioners therefore humbly pray your Honourable House to grant them such further support towards enabling them to carry on the execution of the Trust reposed in them by Parliament for the general bene-

fit of learning and useful knowledge as to your House shall seem meet."—(King's Recommendation signified.)

Referred to the Committee of Supply.

Oral Answers to Questions — LABOUR CONVENTIONS.

Mr. Mr. James Hall: asked the Minister of Labour how many countries have ratified the draft convention concerning the marking of the weight of heavy packages transported by vessels?

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Brown): The Convention referred to by the hon. Member had, in June of this year, been ratified by 34 countries, two of which had appended conditions to their ratifications.

Mr. Hall: Does the right hon. Gentleman not think the Government of this country should ratify this convention?

Mr. Brown: As the hon. Member knows, we are awaiting some inquiries on technical considerations which are now being made by the International Labour Office on this matter.

Mr. Hall: asked the Minister of Labour whether, in connection with his proposed legislation on the subject, he is now prepared to recommend the ratification of the draft convention of the International Labour Office concerning annual holidays with pay and the acceptance of the recommendation on this subject.

Mr. Brown: No, Sir. As I stated in reply to questions on 2nd June, the Government, in agreement with the recommendations of the Committee on Holidays with Pay, do not propose to introduce general legislation to provide for holidays with pay at the present date.

Mr. Hall: In view of the popular opinion on this subject, could not the Government see their way to take action on the lines suggested?

Mr. Brown: I believe the report of the Amulree Committee, which was unanimous, is in line with popular opinion, and that the popular opinion is that the way recommended by the committee is the better way.

Oral Answers to Questions — UNEMPLOYMENT.

SOUTH-WEST DURHAM.

Mr. Sexton asked: the Minister of Labour how many unemployed men have been found work in South-West Durham on Government-aided projects during the years 1935, 1936, and 1937, respectively.

Mr. E. Brown: I assume that the hon. Member is referring to projects aided from the Special Areas Fund, but as I informed the hon. Member for Blaydon (Mr. Whiteley) on 11th November, 1937, it is not possible to give details of the amount of employment provided as a result of such schemes.

Mr. Batey: Surely the Minister can say how many men have been given employment through Government-aided projects in South-West Durham?

Mr. Brown: If the question had been in general terms, yes; but it is a specific one, and I cannot answer it in this form.

VOCATIONAL CENTRES.

Mr. Messer: asked the Minister of Labour whether the taking over of the activities of the Army vocational centres by his Department means that the staffs of the Aldershot, Hounslow and Chisledon centres will be taken over; whether there will be any exceptions; and, if so, what provision is being made for the men affected?

Mr. E. Brown: Posts have been offered by my Department or the War Department to nearly all the staff at these three centres. At the moment, it has not been possible to offer alternative employment to three instructors at Aldershot, and a number of cooks and mess orderlies at Hounslow, but efforts by the two Departments are continuing.

Mr. Messer: I take it that that means that every improvement will be made?

Mr. Brown: Oh, yes, we shall do all we can; the hon. Gentleman can be quite content about it.

Mr. Lawson: Do I understand that it is a definite promise that these men are to be taken over by the Ministry of Labour?

Mr. Brown: I would not say "by the Ministry of Labour," but we shall see that they are employed.

Mr. Lawson: Will some of these men be lowered in their status and in the amounts they receive if they are taken over by the Ministry?

Mr. Brown: That is another question, which I would prefer to see on the Paper.

WEST WALES.

Mr. Hopkin: asked the Minister of Labour whether he has considered the communication from the Llanelly local employment committee, covering parts of East and West Carmarthen; and whether he can now say what steps he proposes to take to implement any and, if so, which of the practical suggestions made by this committee for the reduction of unemployment in West Wales?

Mr. E. Brown: The suggestions for the reduction of unemployment in West Wales recently sent to me by the Llanelly local employment committee concern a number of Departments, and are at present under consideration.

APPEAL TRIBUNALS, GLASGOW (CHAIRMEN).

Mr. Buchanan: asked the Minister of Labour the amount paid to each of the principal chairmen of the appeal committees in Glasgow under the Unemployment Assistance Board during the past 12 months?

Mr. E. Brown: During the year ended 31st March last fees amounting to £142 were paid to the chairman of the Central and North-west Glasgow appeal tribunal, £127 to the chairman of the North and East Glasgow tribunal, and £105 to the chairman of the Glasgow (South Side) tribunal.

ASSISTANCE.

Mr. Buchanan: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that the present method of calculating the claim for dependants' benefit is a very complicated one and very few applicants for benefit can understand the formula; and will he take steps to have the position reviewed and simplified?

Mr. E. Brown: The provisions for the payment of dependants' benefit are necessarily complicated because of the variety of the circumstances with which they deal, and I am not sure that they could be simplified without involving the risk of withdrawal of some of the existing rights to such benefit. I shall, however, be


glad to consider any particular points which the hon. Member may care to send to me.

Mr. Buchanan: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that in a large number of cases it can be quite simply stated what the applicant's rights are? Will he not consider making this a simple matter, instead of one which even his Department cannot understand?

Mr. Brown: I am always glad—and so, indeed, is the Department—to make things as simple as possible. The trouble arising here is not in regard to the law, but the complexity of the circumstances in which the law is to be applied. It is quite easy, to make a certain scheme so simple, as to deprive of benefit those whom we all wish to see entitled to benefit. The hon. Member points out that there are certain points in doubt, but I doubt whether there is need for an inquiry. As the House knows, there was an inquiry some years ago.

Mr. Buchanan: asked the Minister of Labour the number of cases heard by appeal committees under the Unemployment Assistance Board in Glasgow during the past 12 months, and the number in which an increased allowance was granted?

Mr. Brown: During the 12 months ended 31st May last, 2,518 appeals against determinations were adjudicated on by the three appeal tribunals which deal with cases from Glasgow City. In 236 cases the award of the tribunal resulted in an increased payment to the applicant.

Mr. James: Griffiths asked the Minister of Labour whether he has authorised the reimposition by the Unemployment Assistance Board of the not-genuinely-seeking-work test for applicants for unemployment assistance, as indicated on page 22 of the Report of the Board for 1937 (Cmd. 5752); and, in view of the fact that such a test was abolished by the decision of Parliament, what authority the Board has for its reimposition on applicants for allowances?

Mr. Brown: The hon. Member is under a misapprehension. The passage to which he refers relates solely to the considerations involved in adjusting assessments under the Unemployment Assistance Regulations, 1936, where the

assessment would otherwise be greater than, or approximately equal to the amount normally available from earnings.

Mr. Griffiths: Will the Minister give an assurance that, even in that limited number of cases, there will be no restoration of the methods which were adopted some years ago, and which so enraged the country that they had to be stopped?

Mr. Brown: Certainly. That is why I made it clear that the question is really based on a misapprehension.

Mr. Batey: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that on page 5 of the Unemployment Assistance Board's Report there is a statement to the effect that a considerable number of men and women are content to remain on unemployment allowance; and can he say how many of these persons have been offered work and refused it?

Mr. Brown: As indicated in the report, the persons referred to include some who have refused work. As the Board point out, the number is relatively small, but separate statistics are not available.

Mr. Batey: Does not the report say that there are a considerable number of persons who refused to work, and should not the test be to offer them a job?

Mr. Ellis Smith: Is it not unbecoming of people so well placed to make allegations of this kind?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member must not ask a supplementary question of that kind.

Mr. Sandys: asked the Minister of Labour whether, in view of the difficulties which are being experienced by the Unemployment Assistance Board and the Unemployment Insurance Committee, as revealed in their latest reports, owing to the fact that employed persons with large families are in many cases earning less or no more than they would receive if they were unemployed, he will consider the advisability of consulting with representatives of employers' and employés' organisations with a view to exploring the possibility of instituting some system of family allowances designed to bring income into closer relation with family needs?

Mr. Brown: No, Sir. I do not think that practical results would be achieved,


for I have no ground for thinking that such a proposal would be likely to receive sufficient support from these organisations to justify the initiation of consultation on the lines suggested.

Mr. Sandys: Can my right hon. Friend give an assurance that he recognises that this is an urgent and vital social problem, and will give it his careful consideration?

Mr. Brown: I have no doubt of the gravity of the social problem, because more than one converging inquiry has brought facts to light, both by the Unemployment Insurance Statutory Committee and the Unemployment Assistance Board. My hon. Friend asks me to consult with representatives of industry, but I do not think that such a proposal, as far as my information goes in the industrial field, would produce a satisfactory result.

Mr. Short: asked the Minister of Labour whether the practice by which an applicant for unemployment assistance can be accompanied by a friend when interviewing the board's officer is operative at the Doncaster area office?

Mr. Brown: I am informed by the Board that at the Doncaster area office, as at other offices, an applicant is in ordinary circumstances free to be accompanied by a personal friend if he so desires.

Miss Wilkinson: asked the Minister of Labour what is the percentage of applicants in the Jarrow-Hebburn area, as compared with those in the Felling area, who are now in receipt of extra allowances under the Unemployment Assistance Board; and how many in each of these areas, respectively, have been docked of their extra allowance?

Mr. Brown: As regards the first part of the question, the cases in which the Board's officers, in the exercise of their general discretionary powers, had maintained the previous allowance or had reduced it by less than the full amount of the previous addition, represented, approximately, 6½ per cent. of current assessments in Jarrow and 4½ per cent. in Gateshead II. Separate information in respect of Felling is not available. As regards the second part, at the beginning of June in the Board's administrative areas of Jarrow (which includes the town of Hebburn) and Gateshead II (which includes Felling), the numbers of cases in

which a winter allowance had been withdrawn were 1,390 and 1,194, respectively.

Mr. T. Smith: asked the Minister of Labour the number of cases in which unemployment assistance has been given, wholly or partly, in kind during the past six months in the district covered by the Pontefract area office?

Mr. Brown: I am having inquiry made and will communicate the result to the hon. Member as soon as possible.

Mr. Smith: Will the right hon. Gentleman try to ascertain whether relief in kind has been given other than in special cases as defined by Part II of the Unemployment Act?

Mr. Brown: I will ask the Board to take up that point, as well as the general question.

Mr. Smith: In order to allay the anxiety of the unemployed, will the right hon. Gentleman say whether this relief in kind represents a change in policy?

GOVERNMENT CONTRACTS, SOUTH WALES.

Mr. J. Griffiths: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that there is considerable dissatisfaction at the methods by which labour is recruited by contractors engaged in Government work in South Wales; and whether he will take steps to secure the insertion in future contracts of a clause making it obligatory upon all contractors for His Majesty's Government to recruit the labour required through the medium of the Employment Exchanges?

Mr. E. Brown: I have considered the representations which the hon. Member has himself made to me on this subject, but there are considerable practical difficulties in the way of adopting his suggestion precisely in this form. In Government contracts from 1st January last, however, it has been made a contractual obligation for the contractor to notify vacancies to the exchanges, whereas previously this was only a recommendation.

Mr. Griffiths: Is the Minister not aware that to ask the contractors merely to notify the exchanges is not a sufficient guarantee, and is it not reasonable to ask that in view of the money spent by this House in areas like South Wales the contractors should be obliged to use the machinery of the Employment Exchanges to recruit all their labour?

Mr. Brown: The vacancies cannot always be filled from the exchanges locally, but we do everything we can to see that preference is given to local men.

Mr. Griffiths: Could not a provision be inserted in the contracts that where suitable labour is available locally the contractor must use the local exchanges?

Mr. Brown: No, there has been considerable trouble in getting as far as we have got on this matter, and I must see how the system works out.

Mr. Lawson: Is it not the Minister's experience that half of the contractors, if given a chance, will dodge their obligations?

Mr. Brown: I would not like to make a statement like that in general terms.

Mr. Jenkins: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that some of the Government contractors have in their employment a number of men who go from job to job and place to place, and get registered on the local exchanges?

Mr. Brown: As the House knows, there are two sides to this question. There is the question of labour being engaged locally, but there is also the question in some cases of the work being done as speedily as possible.

Mr. J. Griffiths: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the replies, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment at the earliest possible opportunity.

FAMILY BUDGET INQUIRY (VISITORS).

Mr. Tomlinson: asked the Minister of Labour whether he has considered the representations made to him with respect to the remuneration of visitors appointed by employment committees for the collection of family budgets; and what reply has he given to them?

Mr. E. Brown: I have received representations on this subject from the Farnworth Local Employment Committee. The reply given was to the effect that the question whether the visitors who assisted in the inquiry should be remunerated for their services was carefully considered in all its bearings by the committee which advised me as to the methods and procedure to be adopted in the inquiry. The committee, which included representatives of the Trades

Union Congress General Council, the Co-operative movement, and the National Confederation of Employers' Organisations unanimously recommended that payment to the visitors should not be made. I adopted their recommendation and gratefully acknowledge the voluntary help which my Department have received. from visitors in all parts of the country.

TEAM VALLEY TRADING ESTATE.

Mr. Batey: asked the Minister of Labour the amount of money spent on the Team Valley Estate and the number of men of 21 years of age and over employed in the factories on the estate?

Mr. E. Brown: The amount advanced out of the Special Areas Fund to the North-Eastern Trading Estates Company for the development of the Team Valley Estate and the erection of factories thereon is £1,260,000. I have no information as regards the second part of the question.

Mr. Batey: The Minister has been asked the same question before, and is he not going to try to get the information as to the number of men employed over 21 years of age?

Mr. Brown: I could do it only by asking each individual employer. The House must understand that in the Statistical Department of the Ministry there is an enormous amount of work to be done, and I have to do my very best to see that the essential facts are obtained. In this case I do not think that there is sufficient public interest in this subject, unless I have much wider considerations than I have had already.

Mr. Dalton: Have we not frequently been told that this scheme is supposed to be going to make a great contribution towards solving the unemployment problem in the North-East? What is to prevent the right hon. Gentleman causing some junior clerk in his Department to send a letter to a couple of dozen employers concerned?

Mr. Brown: This is only one of a whole series of specific questions that are asked. The hon. Member says that this is supposed to be going to make a big contribution towards solving the unemployment problem. As a matter of fact, it is making a very remarkable contribution.

Mr. Dalton: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that it is not all girls but other forms of labour easily sweated by these employers; it is grown-up men, and why cannot we have the facts?

Mr. Brown: The hon. Gentleman will not advance the cause of reason by thumping that Box and making assertions of that kind. I am concerned not only for men and boys but girls and women—all who are unemployed.

Mr. Batey: The Minister said that the Government have spent over £1,000,000 on this scheme, and if I said that there are very few men over 21 employed, would that be true?

Mr. Brown: I have told the hon. Member that I have not made inquiries, and he knows perfectly well that I cannot answer a question of that kind without having accurate information.

Mr. Attlee: Does not the right hon. Gentleman realise that Members of this House are asking for information, and that it is not for him to judge whether it is desirable or not?

Mr. Brown: I beg the right hon. Gentleman's pardon. It is for me, in the exercise of my responsibilities, to see how best the administrative machine can be used for the convenience of Members and for the public service.

Miss Wilkinson: On a point of Order. May I ask, Mr. Speaker, for your protection of Private Members in this matter? Are we to have a censorship of the type of question we might lawfully ask because the Minister says it is too much bother to answer it?

Mr. Speaker: I do not think that the hon. Lady should interpret what the Minister said in that way. A Minister often indicates that on account of expense or for some other reason he is not justified in trying to obtain the information.

Mr. Attlee: The Minister has not suggested that there is any expense at all, and it has been pointed out that it is merely a matter of writing a few letters.

Mr. J. Griffiths: Has the Minister the sole right of judging whether the information asked for will be so costly as to deprive an hon. Member of the information he seeks?

Mr. Buchanan: Is it right for the Minister, in order to defend the inefficiency of his Department to make a plea which, in fact, is not correct, that to make this inquiry would be a waste of public money?

Mr. Brown: I have made no such statement whatever.

Mr. Sexton: You might think that the trading estate is in the Jordan Valley, and not in the Team Valley.

Mr. David Adams: asked the Minister of Labour whether, in the provision of further trading esstates, it is his intention to give consideration to the desirability of planning for satellite towns, where practicable, in connection therewith; and whether this question was reviewed during the inception of the Team Valley Trading Estate?

Mr. Brown: In selecting sites for the trading estates, the trading estate companies took into consideration the availability of labour for which housing accommodation was already in existence, and having regard to the accessibility of the sites chosen it is not anticipated that any substantial provision of new housing accommodation will be required.

Mr. Adams: I did not ask merely whether there was labour available or not, but whether the question of the creation of satellite towns in an area where there is, as is in the Team Valley Estate, an abundance of land, has been considered, and whether it will be considered in future?

Mr. Brown: If the hon. Gentleman looks at the answer he will see that I said that that was one of the points which the estate company had in mind in selecting this site.

Mr. Shinwell: Can the right hon. Gentleman explain why, in view of the fact that this scheme is financed by public money, the Government cannot exercise a measure of control?

Mr. Brown: This thing has been done throughout by the company under the powers given to the Commissioner, and in the closest contact with the Government.

Mr. Shinwell: Is there any direct control by the Ministry?

GOVERNMENT POLICY.

Mr. Day: asked the Minister of Labour particulars of any further proposals he intends to make for the purpose of mitigating unemployment?

Mr. E. Brown: The policy of the Government in this matter is already well known.

Mr. Day: Cannot the Minister give a direct answer to the question?

Mr. Brown: I hope to give a good many direct answers to-morrow.

Mr. Day: Is it the fact that the people of this country do not know the policy of the Government?

BENEFIT (HOLIDAY PAYMENT).

Mr. E. Smith: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that applicants for ordinary unemployment insurance benefit have had a form issued to them asking what amount they have received in holiday payment; and what is the purpose of asking for this information?

Mr. Brown: Such a form is not being issued in pursuance of any general instruction. I would be glad if the hon. Member would give me particulars in order that inquiry may be made.

Mr. Smith: This is a serious matter. I have a copy of the form in my hand which has just been issued in the area by the Employment Exchange, and I shall be only too pleased to hand it over to the Minister.

Mr. Brown: I shall be glad to receive it because we at the head office know of no such form.

Mr. Buchanan: Is the Minister aware that this sort of thing is not merely confined to one district, the north-east coast in this case. but that the form has been issued on the Clyde; and can he state what powers he or his officials have to issue such a form to persons on standard benefit?

Mr. Brown: I have said that we know of no such instruction at all, and I shall be glad to look into the case and give further information to the House.

Mr. Jenkins: Has the form been issued by the right hon. Gentleman's Department without his knowledge?

Mr. Brown: It may be that in pursuance of regulations the insurance officer may have taken a certain view of his duties—I do not know. The House cannot expect me in advance of making my inquiries to make a further statement.

Mr. Batey: This is a very important matter. This form was issued by the Gateshead Employment Exchange.

Mr. Brown: I will look into the matter. Immediate inquiry will be made.

Mr. Leonard: Can the House not press that the time stipulated as necessary notice for a question should be used by the Minister to ascertain the facts when they are available?

Mr. Speaker: The Minister has said that he does not know anything about it, and he has promised to inquire.

DISABLED EX-SERVICE MEN.

Mr. Roland Robinson: asked the Minister of Labour what special efforts are made to provide sheltered accupations for disabled ex-service men who are classified as light labourers, and classified under serial number L 486 at the Employment Exchanges?

Mr. E. Brown: Special efforts are made in the first instance to place these men as far as possible with firms which are enrolled on the King's National Roll. The Employment Exchanges, acting in cooperation with local King's Roll committees, also try to find employment for these men with other employers and local authorities not on the Roll whenever possible. During 1937 nearly 9,000 vacancies were filled by disabled ex-service men classified as light labourers or other similar occupations.

Mr. Robinson: Will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to see that as many of these positions as possible are occupied by disabled ex-service men rather than by women at lower wages?

Mr. Brown: That has been the policy of the Ministry throughout.

HOLIDAYS WITH PAY.

Mr. Graham White: asked the Minister of Labour whether a recipient of pay for a holiday period under an agreed scheme for holidays with pay is entitled,


during the holiday period, to continue his employment or to seek employment elsewhere?

Mr. E. Brown: I understand that the great majority of these agreements contain no provision on this subject. In a few cases it is stipulated that holiday pay is not due if the worker works in his own trade during the holiday and, in others, if he works at any gainful employment.

Mr. White: Will the right hon. Gentleman keep a searchlight on this particular matter, in view of the anxiety in some quarters as to the development of the practice referred to?

Mr. Brown: I will watch it very carefully, but, as the House will understand, the trades concerned are trades where there are the most effective collective agreements, and the understanding has been regularly and well carried out.

Mr. Roland Robinson: Will my right hon. Friend advise that people taking paid holidays should not be allowed to follow this practice?

Mr. J. Griffiths: What would be the position of men in receipt of unemployment assistance who had become entitled to holidays with pay before becoming unemployed?

Mr. Brown: That question was put to me the other day by my hon. Friend the Member for Wallsend (Miss Ward), and I pointed out to her that such cases had been submitted to the umpire for decision.

Mr. R. Robinson: asked the Minister of Labour (I) whether the standing inter-departmental committee to deal with the co-ordination of holiday arrangements has now been set up; who is chairman of this committee; and what are its functions;
(2) whether he has now set up the special branch of his Department to carry out the recommendations of the Holidays with Pay Committee; what is its personnel; and what are its functions?

Mr. Brown: The standing inter-departmental committee is being set up by the appointment of representatives of all the Government Departments concerned and will work under the chairmanship of the

Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Labour. Its functions will be to coordinate the activities of the different Departments in this connection. For the time being the work connected with this committee and other questions arising out of the Government's policy in regard to holidays with pay is being done by a branch of the General Department of the Ministry. I cannot at this stage foresee to what extent that staff will need to be increased as a result of the extra work which will no doubt fall upon it.

Mr. Robert Gibson: Will the committee also deal with the question of the dates of the school holidays in all parts of the country?

Mr. Brown: Yes, Sir. That is what the committee is intended to do, to see that all the questions affecting all departments come under review.

FEEBLE-MINDED PRISONERS (PICTURE BOOKS).

Mr. Benson: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department what is the approximate number of picture books available for feeble-minded prisoners in local prisons and in convict prisons, respectively; and whether such prisoners are deprived, by prison regulations, of these picture books when in the punishment cells?

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sir Samuel Hoare): There are 865 picture books in local prisons and 65 in convict prisons available for such prisoners; these numbers are exclusive of illustrated periodicals. The answer to the second part of the question is in the negative.

Mr. Benson: Does the right hon. Gentleman think that prison is a proper place for the feeble-minded or the mental defective?

Sir S. Hoare: That is a very general question on a totally different aspect to deal with by way of a supplementary answer.

Mr. Benson: Does the right hon. Gentleman contemplate that some steps will be taken to eliminate feeble-minded people from prison?

AIR-RAID PRECAUTIONS.

Mr. Poole: asked the Home Secretary how many civilian organisers have been appointed as air-raid precaution officers in England and Wales to date?

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Geoffrey Lloyd): I assume that the hon. Member refers to organisers appointed by local authorities. My information is not at present complete, but I am aware of some 250 appointments as organisers.

Mr. Poole: Are these appointments made from the civil population as opposed to the military population?

Mr. Lloyd: The matter is for the local authority. They decide according to the circumstances.

Mr. Short: asked the Home Secretary when the three trailer pumps allocated to Doncaster for air-raid precautions will be delivered?

Mr. Lloyd: On 19th May my right hon. Friend asked the Doncaster Council if they were prepared to take delivery on the usual conditions of the three trailer pumps allocated to Doncaster. No reply has yet been received, but if the council accept this offer, the pumps can be made available towards the end of next month.

Mr. Short: Can the Under-Secretary get into touch with the council, because the chief constable complains that the training of the auxiliary fire brigade is being delayed as a result of non-delivery.

Mr. Lloyd: I think there must be some confusion. If the Doncaster Town Council had replied they would have received the fire engines more quickly.

Mr. George Hall: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education whether he will give the percentage of schools in the country where the teaching staffs have received written instructions in connection with the air-raid precautions scheme, and the authority supplying the instructions to the schools?

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education (Mr. Lindsay): I am not certain what the hon. Member has in mind by "written instructions," but f he will communicate with me I shall be glad to supply him with any information at my disposal.

TAXIMETER CABS.

Mr. Hulbert: asked the Home Secretary whether he will consider making regulations to permit the installation of radio receiving-sets in taximeter-cabs in order to bring London into line with Continental cities in this respect?

Sir S. Hoare: If there is a general public desire for more noise in the streets of London, this matter would be considered, but at present the Commissioner of Police, who is the licensing authority for taxicabs in London, takes the vew, with which I concur, that in the general public interest it is preferable that wireless sets should not be installed in London taxicabs.

Rear-Admiral Sir Murray Sueter: asked the Home Secretary whether, in order to ameliorate the difficulties of the London cab trade, he will authorise more stands, for not more than three cabs each, to be placed in by-streets off lines of traffic, each one equipped with a telephone call-box; and will he also arrange existing telephone call-boxes on cab ranks to be made more widely known in the Metropolitan residential areas?

Sir S. Hoare: The Commissioner of Police has informed me that he proposes to investigate, in consultation with the London Cab Ranks Joint Committee, the possibility of appointing additional cab ranks in by-streets and the question of equipping any such additional ranks with telephone call-boxes will be considered at the same time. As regards the last part of the question, the London Telephone Directory already gives considerable prominence to the telephone numbers of cab ranks in London.

Miss Wilkinson: asked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that many London taximeter-cab drivers have had to purchase cabs on hire purchase since the Commissioner's order in 1936; and whether, as in view of the heavy competition of private-hire cars, subject to none of the disabilities, expenses, and regulations imposed on taximeter-cab drivers, it is difficult, and in some cases impossible, for the men to keep up payments on the cars, lie will give special speedy consideration to the London position in order to check unfair competition pending the Commissioner's report?

Sir S. Hoare: I recognise the anxiety of the taximeter-cab drivers that this question shall be reviewed without delay, and as I stated in reply to a question last week it has been arranged to investigate the question by means of a small committee as quickly as possible. Legislation, however, would be necessary to give effect to the drivers' proposals.

Mr. Turton: Is my right hon. Friend aware that Sir Oswald Mosley has declared himself a convinced supporter of the hon. Lady's policy in this respect?

Miss Wilkinson: Does the Home Secretary's reply mean that the London taxi-men, in view of their special case, will be treated on merit and not have to wait until the committee has reported with regard to the rest of the country.

Sir S. Hoare: A question of that kind must depend upon the procedure of the committee, but however they act, I see no reason why we should not have their report in the comparatively near future.

Sir William Davison: Will not my right hon. Friend press upon the committee the importance of an early report?

Mr. Benjamin Smith: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us when the committee propose to commence their sittings, when evidence will be taken, and how soon he thinks that the report will be published?

Sir S. Hoare: I hope to be able to make a statement on the personnel of the committee in the comparatively near future. I think I should wait until then before attempting to answer the other questions of the hon. Member.

Mr. Smith: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us whether he is prepared to receive a deputation, which has been asked for by cab drivers, in order that they may put their point of view with regard to the question being limited to London, to which the Hackney Carriage Act applies?

Sir S. Hoare: I suggest to the hon. Member that that is the kind of question that ought to go to the committee.

ALIENS (CONFERENCE, LONDON).

The following Question stood upon the Order Paper:

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: To ask the Secretary of State for the

Home Department what has been the approximate number of aliens who have been refused entry to this country during the current year; how many applications he has received for aliens to visit this country for the proposed godless conference; and how many of these he has refused?

Mr. Gallacher: I want to ask, Mr. Speaker, whether it is in Order for an hon. Member to put down a question which, obviously, refers to a congress of free thinkers in London, and to use language which cannot be anything but offensive to the religious views of many people in this country?

Mr. Speaker: If there is any reference to religious views in the question which would hurt the feelings of anybody, it would be very objectionable.

Sir T. Moore: May I point out that there is nothing in the question which suggests any interference with anyone's religious beliefs?

Mr. Herbert Morrison: I understand that the people who are holding this conference do not describe it as a godless conference. It is a conference of free thinkers, and in that case is it right that there should creep into a question in this House what really is a term of abuse?

Mr. Speaker: I have already stated my views.

Sir S. Hoare: The answer to the question is that the number of aliens refused leave to land in this country for the five months ended 31st May was 688. As regards the second part of the question, I have nothing to add to the reply which I gave on 7th April to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for the Peebles and Southern Division (Captain Ramsay).

Sir T. Moore: Will the right hon. Gentleman consider seeking powers from this House to enable him to refuse entry to the people attending this conference, in view of the very strong feeling that has been shown by many sections of the community on this subject?

Sir S. Hoare: I have already answered several questions in that connection and I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the answers I have given.

Mr. Riley: May I ask whether the figures the Home Secretary gave include any refugees?

Sir S. Hoare: As far as I know we have refused scarcely any refugees. The figures relate to aliens generally.

Mr. Gallacher: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that a conference of free thinkers was held in Glasgow three weeks ago and did not seem to give offence to anyone?

Mr. Thurtle: Will the Home Secretary agree that there is no reason at all why we should refuse admission to any alien to this country for the purpose of attending this perfectly legal and proper conference?

Sir S. Hoare: I have already answered numberless questions on this subject. I have made my position quite clear, and I have nothing to add to what I have said.

HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT (POLICE).

Mr. Tinker: asked the Home Secretary whether he will give consideration to allowing policemen on duty inside the Houses of Parliament to be without head-cover, helmets, as during the warm weather they are a discomfort?

Sir S. Hoare: After consultation with the Commissioner of Police I do not feel that there are any strong grounds for modifying the present practice in this matter. I have not had any evidence that the wearing of the helmet by men on duty in the Houses of Parliament causes discomfort.

Mr. Tinker: Will not the right hon. Gentleman consider giving them this relief during the warm weather? We always get into lighter clothing to meet the warm weather and surely these people are entitled to some consideration?

Mr. Gallacher: If the right hon. Gentleman does contemplate a change I hope he will be quite sure that he does not make them look like convicts.

Mr. Tinker: Will not the right hon. Gentleman give further consideration to this matter?

WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION (ROYAL COMMISSION).

Mr. E. Smith: asked the Home Secretary whether he has given consideration to the report of the Departmental Committee on certain questions arising

under the Workmen's Compensation Acts; and whether it is the intention of the Government to implement the recommendations of the report?

Sir S. Hoare: I would refer the hon. Member to the replies given yesterday by the Prime Minister to questions relative to the appointment of a Royal Commission.

Mr. T. Smith: Does that mean that as a Royal Commission is to be appointed we are to have no legislation on the recommendations made by the Departmental Committee?

Sir S. Hoare: If the hon. Member will look at the answers which the Prime Minister gave yesterday he will find that my right hon. Friend dealt with that point.

Mr. Smith: Can the right hon. Gentleman give an assurance that these matters will be dealt with as soon as possible?

Sir S. Hoare: The Prime Minister dealt fully with that question yesterday, and perhaps the hon. Member will refer to the answer.

POLICEWOMEN.

Mr. Day: asked the Home Secretary the number of local police authorities that have appointed women police; what is the proportion in relation to the total authorised force in question; and will he give separately the figures for the Metropolitan and City of London police forces?

Sir S. Hoare: There are 45 county and borough police authorities which have appointed policewomen. In most of these forces the number of women appointed is one, two, three or four. The only provincial forces with larger numbers of women are Birmingham with 16, Lancashire 14, Gloucestershire seven, Manchester five, and Bolton five. The number of women in the Metropolitan Police Force is 102, and in the City none.

Mr. Day: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether any of these members of the Metropolitan Police Force are regularly employed in the Criminal Investigation Department?

Sir S. Hoare: No, Sir.

POLITICAL PROCESSIONS, LONDON.

Mr. G. Strauss: asked the Home Secretary whether he proposes to take any


action on the lines suggested in the report of the Metropolitan Commissioner of Police that all demonstrations in London should be banned?

Sir S. Hoare: In his last report the Commissioner of Police for the Metropolis drew attention to the serious drain on the resources of the police caused by political processions and to the fact that they are thereby diverted from other duties; but no general prohibition of political processions in the Metropolis would be possible without legislation. The question was discussed when the Public Order Act, 1936, was before the House, and no fresh legislation is contemplated at present.

DISTRIBUTION OF INDUSTRY (COMMISSIONS REPORT).

Mr. W. Joseph Stewart: asked the Prime Minister when the report of the Royal Commission appointed to inquire into the question of the geographical distribution of the industrial population will be completed?

The Prime Minister (Mr. Chamberlain): I cannot at present add anything to the answer which I gave on 11th May to the hon. Member for Llanelly (Mr. J. Griffiths).

Mr. Stewart: Can the Prime Minister give an approximate date when the report may be expected?

The Prime Minister: No, Sir, I cannot add anything to what I have said.

BOMBING, NORTH-WEST FRONTIER.

Mr. Mander: asked the Prime Minister whether he will consider the advisability of proposing the appointment of a British or International Commission to examine the conditions under which police bombing takes place on the northwest frontier of India with a view to informing public opinion generally on the subject?

The Prime Minister: The conditions regulating the use of bombing on the north-west frontier have often been publicly stated, and I would refer the hon. Member in particular to the statement contained in Command Paper No.

5495 of June, 1937. I see no necessity for the appointment of any Commission as suggested by the hon. Member.

Mr. Mander: In view of the real anxiety felt on this subject both in this country and abroad, and the attacks that are being made on Britain's good name in connection with it, does not the Prime Minister think that it would be desirable in the public interest to obtain some impartial report which will command confidence?

The Prime Minister: No, Sir.

Mr. Pilkington: Can the right hon. Gentleman say whether so humane a method of police bombing is carried out by any other country in the world?

CLUBS (LEGISLATION).

Captain Sir Derrick Gunston: asked the Prime Minister whether he is in a position to make a statement as to the introduction of the proposed legislation to deal with bogus clubs?

The Prime Minister: As the House knows, it was the intention of the Government to introduce a Bill on this subject in the present Session, but at this date, after reviewing the claims on the time of Parliament during the remainder of the Session, they can see no hope of finding the necessary time, and they have regretfully come to the conclusion that it will not be possible to include such a Bill in this Session's programme.

APPROVED SCHOOLS (ACCOMMODATION).

Mr. Leach: asked the Home Secretary whether his attention has been drawn to the severe shortage of approved schools, particularly for senior girls, and the grave difficulties of local authorities thereby resulting; and whether he has any proposals to make on the matter?

Sir S. Hoare: I regret that the accommodation in approved schools is still inadequate in spite of all the measures taken by the Home Office since the need for new schools became apparent. As regards senior girls, 12 new schools have been approved in the last five years providing for 360 girls. With one exception all these places have been provided by voluntary bodies, though the responsibility for remedying the deficiency of


accommodation is placed by statute on local authorities. I have repeatedly called the attention of local authorities to their powers and duties. I am glad to add that three local authorities have agreed to provide schools for senior girls, and one of these is likely to be opened in the course of the next few months. In this way I hope the pressure will be eventually relieved.

Mr. Leach: Is it possible for local authorities to combine on schemes for these schools if they wish?

Sir S. Hoare: Yes, I think that is possible.

Mr. Maxton: Would it not be better to tell magistrates not to sentence children to these places as easily as they do?

FACTORY ACT.

Mr. Morgan: asked the Home Secretary whether he is aware of the delay in dealing with trade applications under the new Factory Act, and that many of the forms which were supposed to be posted up in factories on 1st July have not yet been issued; and whether, in view of the embarrassment which this delay is causing to local factory inspectors and factory owners, he will arrange either to expedite the issue of the necessary applications or to postpone the operative date of the Act?

Sir S. Hoare: Practically all the forms have been sent for press and are either now obtainable from the Stationery Office, or will be very shortly. A circular to employers about the forms is being issued this week. I appreciate that in some cases employers will be unable to obtain immediately all the forms required for full compliance with the Act, and that various applications from particular trades for regulations modifying particular provisions have not yet been disposed of; but I do not think that this affords good grounds for postponing the operative date of the Act, which indeed I have no power to do except as regards some of the safety provisions. To secure the complete and smooth working of an Act of this magnitude is necessarily a gradual process, and I am sure the inspectorate will not press employers unreasonably where they have a good excuse for delay and are making every effort to comply as soon as possible.

WOMEN'S VOLUNTARY SERVICES.

Dr. Edith Summerskill: asked the Home Secretary what attributes he has looked for in selecting officers for the Women's Voluntary Services, seeing that the officers he has selected for service appointments have no practical experience of the conditions of the people in the industrial and congested areas?

Mr. Lloyd: Apart from a very small secretarial staff of civil servants, the women working for Women's Voluntary Services are voluntary workers whose appointment is a matter for those services. I understand, however, that the Women's Voluntary Services are making it their aim to obtain the co-operation and help of women of all types of experience and knowledge.

Dr. Summerskill: Does the hon. Gentleman know that organised women and unorganised women in this country who are called upon to form the rank and file of these services are extremely dissatisfied with the arbitrary manner in which the Home Secretary has appointed the higher command?

Mr. Lloyd: No, Sir; that does not accord with my information.

Dr. Summerskill: Does the hon. Gentleman know more about organised and unorganised women than I do?

Mr. Lloyd: I have had the advantage of the advice of a number of other women.

Dr. Summerskill: Has the hon. Gentleman had the advice of women who understand the conditions in the industrial and congested areas?

Mr. Lloyd: Certainly.

Miss Wilkinson: Does the hon. Gentleman really think that a matter of this importance to the women of the country should have been put in the hands of fashionable society ladies and young debutantes?

OPEN-AIR MEETING, HACKNEY.

Mr. Watkins: asked the Home Secretary whether he has considered the petition from Hackney residents and others, who were present at a political open-air


meeting on 7th June which was the scene of disorder; and what action he proposes to prevent such occurrences in future?

Sir S. Hoare: I have received a petition suggesting that the disorder at this meeting was due to the failure of the police to take necessary precautions, and asking for an inquiry to be held. The Commissioner of Police informs me that for the first three-quarters of an hour the meeting was quite orderly, but a section of the audience then became noisy, and an interrupter who used insulting language was arrested. Subsequently the disorder increased and the police asked the speaker to close the meeting. He refused to do so, and in order to prevent more serious disturbances the police dispersed the crowd. It is, of course, the duty of the police to take such steps as are within their powers to prevent breaches of the peace, but they cannot ensure that breaches of the peace will never occur at outdoor meetings. I am satisfied that on this occasion prompt action was taken by the police as soon as the circumstances warranted their intervention.

Mr. Watkins: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that quite frequently in the East End of London Fascist speakers use the most insulting language about the Jewish people, and will he press the police to redouble their efforts to prevent these occurrences, which are certain to lead to breaches of the peace?

Sir S. Hoare: Provocative statements are being made at public meetings in this district by extremists of both parties. Certainly as far as the police are concerned they will take every practicable step to bring the guilty parties to account. The difficulty, as the hon. Member knows, is very often to obtain sufficiently definite evidence with which to go to the court.

Mr. Mander: Does the right hon. Gentleman realise that Sir Oswald Mosley has declared himself a strong supporter of the Government's foreign policy?

REFUGEES.

Mr. Riley: asked the Home Secretary the number of political or other refugees who have arrived at British ports since 1st May, 1938, and the number of such refugees who have been refused permission to land?

Sir S. Hoare: Large numbers of persons holding German and Austrian passports come into this country every week. The great majority of these are visitors who go out again after a few days or a few weeks, and it is not possible until some time has elapsed to compile figures showing how many of those entering the country in a particular month are refugees and will wish to stay in this country. I would refer the hon. Member to the reply which I gave on the subject to the hon. and learned Member for Greenock (Mr. Gibson) on 28th April. As regards the last part of the question, the number of passengers holding German and Austrian passports who have been refused leave to land between 1st May and 19th June is 29 and 4 respectively.

Mr. Riley: Were any of the 29 persons who were refused political refugees?

Sir S. Hoare: I do not think any Home Secretary ever gives details of the refusal of passports of that kind, but I can tell the hon. Gentleman that they were not refugees.

Mr. Leach: Have any of the political refugees been referred to Spen Valley, where there is a place open?

LAND ACQUISITION, BERKSHIRE (ELEMENTARY SCHOOL).

Mr. Lansbury: asked the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education what was the price awarded at arbitration for the five acres compulsorily acquired by the Berkshire County Council for the purpose of an elementary school, the arbitration having been held in Oxford in January, 1937, and the owner of the site having claimed a price of £600 per acre?

Mr. Lindsay: It is assumed that this question relates to the site of just under five acres of the Botley Council School, which was compulsorily acquired by the Berkshire local education authority for £2,250. The Board are not aware of the price claimed by the owner at the arbitration proceedings.

LOCAL AUTHORITIES (STATUTORY POWERS).

Mr. Morgan: asked the Minister of Health whether there is available in his


Department a tabulated summary of the statutory powers possessed by the various local authorities throughout the country; and whether, in view of the fact that there is at present no available index of these statutes, arrangements can be made for such a summary to be published or for a copy of it to be made available in the Library of the House of Commons, in order to assist those Members who wish to ascertain what powers are possessed by certain local authorities or what local authorities possess certain powers?

The Minister of Health (Mr. Elliot): I have no tabulated summary available of the kind to which my hon. Friend refers. An index of local and private Acts is issued each year as one of the publications for which the Statute Law Committee is responsible, and in this connection I would draw attention to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Attorney-General to a question by my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Joel) on 10th November last. I shall always be glad to assist individual Members with such information as my own Departmental records will supply.

RATING AND VALUATION.

Brigadier-General Clifton Brown: asked the Minister of Health whether a committee has been appointed to consider the difficulties that have arisen under the Rating and Valuation Act which have caused the postponement of the quinquennial valuation in country districts; of whom that committee consists; and whether they will consult with agricultural interests on the rating of agricultural cottages?

Mr. Elliot: I hope that it will be practicable to set up the committee to which my hon. and gallant Friend refers at an early date; I have invited Mr. Maurice Fitzgerald, K.C., to act as Chairman, and he has agreed to do so, but I am not yet in a position to announce the constitution of the committee. Its scope will cover the whole of the allegations in the light of which the Rating and Valuation (Postponement of Valuation) Act, 1938, was passed, and the committee will, I am sure, obtain all material evidence before making their report.

Brigadier-General Brown: Will agricultural interests be able to give evidence before that committee?

Mr. Elliot: I am sure they will take all material evidence, of which I should certainly include that of the agricultural interests.

Mr. Poole: Surely, agricultural interests would not be considered by the right hon. Gentleman to be competent to advise on the rating of their own property?

Mr. Pilkington: asked the Minister of Health whether, in considering the whole question of local taxation and rates, he will consider the possibility of future assessment on ability to pay, as in Income Tax procedure, instead of on the size of the property, so that the heads of large families are not penalised through having to live in large houses; and whether he will give consideration to the possibility that the present practice is one reason for the low birth-rate?

Mr. Elliot: I have noted the suggestion of my hon. Friend.

Oral Answers to Questions — PUBLIC HEALTH.

MILK CONTAINERS.

Brigadier-General Brown: asked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been directed to the recent Report of the Agricultural Research Council complaining that milk churns are frequently returned by the dealer to the producer unsterilised and grossly contaminated by bacteria; and whether he will consider an official definition of cleanliness and make this practice a fineable offence?

Mr. Elliot: The Milk and Dairies Order, 1926, places a duty on the dealer to cleanse churns thoroughly before returning them to the producer, and on the producer to cleanse and scald with boiling water or steam all vessels used by him for containing milk. Failure to carry out these duties is a fineable offence. I am not at present satisfied that an attempt at closer definition would assist in the administration of the law.

Sir Joseph Leech: asked the Minister of Health the means by which local authorities under their by-laws or by statute make certain that returned empty small glass receptacles and returned empty metal containers used in the retail and wholesale distribution of milk are rendered physically and bacteriologically clean before re-use as milk containers?

Mr. Elliot: The Milk and Dairies Order, 1926, requires every vessel used for containing milk to be kept at all times in a state of thorough cleanliness and in particular to be washed after use and cleansed and scalded with boiling water or steam before it is used again.

RURAL WATER SUPPLY (DOWSERS).

Mr. Perkins: asked the Minister of Health whether it is his policy to encourage rural district councils to make use of the services of dowsers in outlying areas?

Mr. Elliot: The technical methods to be adopted in the preparation of schemes of water supply are primarily the responsibility of the local authorities.

Mr. Perkins: Do I understand from my right hon. Friend's reply that he himself does not believe in the universal practice of dowsing?

Mr. Elliot: I said that the proper persons to decide on the methods to be employed are the people who are getting the water. That is, the local authorities.

Sir T. Moore: What is a dowser?

SMALLPDX CASE, GRAVESEND.

Mr. Leach: asked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been drawn to the circumstances attending the death from smallpox of Miss Nolan at Gravesend on 20th May; whether he is aware that her father died on 28th April with considerable signs of smallpox but was medically certified as dying from influenza; and will he cause an inquiry to be held?

Mr. Elliot: My attention has been drawn to the death from smallpox of Miss Nolan and of the death of Mr. Nolan which was certified as due to heart failure following influenza. Inquiries have been made by a medical officer of my Department and I am advised that the symptoms and physical signs in the case of Mr. Nolan were not such as to enable a diagnosis of smallpox to be made.

Mr. Leach: Does the Minister know that very few doctors in this country have ever seen a case of smallpox, and that they are not, therefore, very competent to diagnose one?

Mr. Elliot: That is a great tribute to the improvement in the public health.

MIDWIVES (ANALGESIA).

and 72. Dr. Summerskill: asked the Minister of Health (I) how many local authorities have arranged for the midwives in their employ to have special instruction in order that they may unaided give their patients analgesia;
(2) how many local authorities have availed themselves of the powers conferred upon them to provide the necessary apparatus for their midwives in order that analgesia may be available for women at their confinements?

Mr. Elliot: I propose to include a request for this information in the annual return which I shall be receiving from local authorities for this year.

NURSING SERVICE.

Mr. F. O. Roberts: asked the Minister of Health when any report from the committee dealing with the nursing service will be ready for presentation?

Mr. Elliot: I understand that this committee are still engaged in the hearing of evidence and I am not able to say when they will be in a position to issue a report.

Mr. Roberts: In view of the urgency of the matter and the view which has been expressed in all quarters of the House that a Bill should have been introduced some time ago, can the Minister not do something to speed up the presentation of this report?

Mr. Elliot: I am afraid it would be injudicious of me to say that I would attempt to hustle this committee which is engaged in such an important task.

NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE.

Mr. W. H. Green: asked the Minister of Health whether he has considered the report recently published by the British Medical Association outlining a scheme for a national health service; and is it his intention to take any action in the matter?

Mr. Elliot: I am not yet in a position to indicate the attitude of the Government in the matter.

SLUM CLEARANCE.

Mr. Day: asked the Minister of Health the number of resolutions he has received from local authorities declaring


unhealthy and clearance areas in accordance with the provisions of Section I (3) of the Housing Act, 1930, that are still awaiting his final decision; and the number of persons who will be affected by the operations of clearance suggested in these resolutions?

Mr. Elliot: The number of orders submitted to me by local authorities and not yet confirmed is 2,926. These orders affect houses occupied by 127,556 persons. The number of orders already confirmed by me is 14,444 and these orders affect 809,908 people. There are 1,258 orders in respect of which declarations have been made (affecting 86,031 people) which have not yet been submitted to me.

Mr. Day: As there seems to be such a large number outstanding, can the right hon. Gentleman say whether he proposes to take any further action?

Mr. Elliot: The provision of new houses is the determining factor, and these houses are being built as fast as the resources of the building industry permit.

Mr. Day: Does the Minister's Department concern itself with providing alternative accommodation for these people?

Mr. Elliot: No, Sir.

VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTORY PENSIONS.

Mr. White: asked the Minister of Health whether he will state as on the last convenient date the number of applications received under the Contributory Pensions (Voluntary Contributors) Act. 1937, and the number of applicants who have been found to be qualified for the benefits of the Act?

Mr. Elliot: On 15th June, 1938, the latest date for which figures are available, 287,636 applications for admission to the new voluntary pensions scheme had been received in England, Scotland and Wales, and 202,814 applicants had, at the same date, been found to be qualified for admission to the scheme. 37,337 applications are still under consideration.

NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE.

Mr. Jenkins: asked the Minister of Health whether any steps are being taken with a view to getting agreement amongst

the approved societies under the National Health Insurance Act to bring about an equalisation of benefits; and, if not, will he give consideration to the advisability of doing so?

Mr. Elliot: As the hon. Member will appreciate, a complete equalisation of benefits under National Health Insurance would be inconsistent with the retention of the approved society system of administration and I do not think there is any prospect of getting agreement amongst approved societies in favour of such a change.

Mr. Jenkins: In view of the fact that there are such great differences between the rates paid under National Health Insurance, and in view also of the varying incidence of sickness upon different approved societies, will the Minister take steps to make the National Health Insurance scheme really national in character?

Mr. Whiteley: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that the Royal Commission recommended at least partial pooling?

Mr. Elliot: The hon. Member knows as well as I do the difficulties which would arise from any such course.

ALLOTMENTS (GRIMSBY).

Mr. Kelly: asked the Minister of Health whether, since June, 1936, when 13½ acres of land at Little Coates was under offer for allotments at a price of £5,000, the Grimsby Corporation have been able to establish the allotments on that site; if so, at what cost for the land; whether the corporation consulted the Ministry about the landowner's price in the first instance; and, if other land had to be or was acquired, what was its area, price, and previous rateable value?

Mr. Elliot: No application has been made to me by the corporation for loan sanction for the purchase of allotments since June, 1936. I have no information as to this particular site.

SALE OF REFRESHMENTS (NIGHT WORKERS).

Mr. Bellenger: asked the Minister of Health whether the conditions of employment amongst night workers engaged in the sale of refreshments are subject to any statutory control?

Mr. Lloyd: I have been asked to reply. Premises for the sale of refreshments are generally shops within the meaning of the Shops Acts, and employment therein is regulated by those Acts. There is, however, no special provision relating to employment at night except in the case of young persons under 18 whose employment is prohibited during a period of at least II consecutive hours, including the period from 10 o'clock in the evening until 6 o'clock in the morning, except that boys over 16 may, under certain conditions, be employed until midnight in the service of meals for consumption on the premises.

Mr. Bellenger: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that in some of these all-night milk bars, excessively long hours are being worked; and is it possible for his Department to make a few inquiries in that direction?

Mr. Lloyd: I am not aware of that, but we will make inquiries.

BUILDING SOCIETIES (MORTGAGES).

Sir J. Leech: asked the Financial Secretary to the Treasury whether he will take steps to secure that building societies shall lodge more explanatory data to show the position of mortgaged properties in possession or in arrears of payment of interest and amortization, and to publish in the official accounts a suitable analysis of such figures?

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Captain Euan Wallace): By Section 2 (I) (b) of the Building Societies Act, 1894, a society is required to set out in its annual account and statement such particulars in regard to properties in possession and mortgage repayments in arrear as are mentioned in the First Schedule to the Act. An extension of the existing requirements could only be effected by an amending Act. The matter will be noted for consideration when occasion arises for general amending legislation; but if my hon. Friend has any specific point in mind perhaps he will let me know.

AUSTRIAN LOANS.

Mr. G. Strauss: asked the Chancellor of the Exchequer what action he is

now taking in view of the declared default of Germany on the Austrian loans?

The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir John Simon): Negotiations are now taking place in London with representatives of the German Government, and I am not at present in a position to make any further statement.

Mr. Strauss: Will the Chancellor say whether the German Government have been informed that unless they are prepared to agree to reasonable terms a clearing house arrangement will be set up for trade between this country and Germany?

Sir J. Simon: I think the hon. Gentleman will see that when negotiations are taking place there may be good reasons for making no further statement.

Mr. Mander: Is there not danger that unless firm action is taken, the Prime Minister's plan for a four-Power Pact may be endangered?

DOGS (QUARANTINE REGULATIONS).

Mr. Messer: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will consider a relaxation of the quarantine regulations which are strictly enforced on individual owners of dogs coming into this country, in view of the special treatment afforded to foreign owners of dogs trained for public performances, by which they can escape quarantine by giving an undertaking to keep their dogs in confinement?

The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. W. S. Morrison): Every dog imported from abroad is without exception required on landing to undergo a period of six months strict isolation on premises approved by the Minister which must not be the premises of the owner of the dog. Dogs, other than performing dogs, must be detained for the prescribed quarantine on the premises of a veterinary surgeon. Those imported expressly for public performances are required to be isolated either on the premises of the theatre where they are engaged to perform, if proper accommodation exists there, or on veterinary premises, subject in either case to frequent inspection. I am satisfied that no relaxation of these regulations would be justifiable.

BOMBING OF BRITISH SHIPS.

Mr. Sandys: (by Private Notice) asked the Prime Minister whether he can give particulars regarding the bombing and sinking of British merchant vessels off Valencia yesterday and whether His Majesty's Government propose to take any action?

The Prime Minister: At 8.50 p.m. on 21st June the British steamship "Thorpeness," which was lying three-quarters of a mile from the breakwater light off Valencia, was struck from the air by a projectile and sank in seven minutes. I regret to say that one member of the crew, a British subject from Hong Kong, is believed to be missing, but otherwise there are no casualties. At 3 a.m. on 22nd June, an attack was made on the British steamship "Sunion," which was also lying in Valencia roads. It is understood that a warning bomb was dropped and that the crew were in the boats when the ship was hit. There' were no casualties and the vessel sank at 9 a.m. His Majesty's Government are asking the Burgos authorities for an early explanation of these attacks.

Mr. Sandys: Does my right hon. Friend realise that the failure of Great Britain to offer any resistance to these unlawful acts of violence is an encouragement to law-breakers, not only in Spain but all over the world?

The Prime Minister: The policy and position of His Majesty's Government have been fully explained.

Mr. Attlee: Is it not clear that these outrages are the direct result of the right hon. Gentleman's speech, which was tantamount to an invitation to bomb British ships?

The Prime Minister: These are not the first attacks of the kind that have been made.

Mr. Lloyd George: I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether the protest is to be sent to those to whom these bombing engines belong, or whether he is going to confine his protest to the Franco Government, whereas these engines which are destroying our ships belong to the Italian and German Governments?

The Prime Minister: I do not know what authority the right hon. Gentleman

has for stating that these machines belong to the German or Italian Governments. They are, as I understand, part of the forces of General Franco.

Mr. Lloyd George: May I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he has not got abundant evidence—and if he has not got it we can supply it to him—that some of these machines belong to the Italian Government? He must know it. I am going to ask him now whether he is not going to send a protest about these pilots to the Governments who supply these machines and supply these pilots, or whether he is going to confine it merely to the Franco Government?

The Prime Minister: These machines must be considered in exactly the same category as other arms and equipment supplied from foreign countries to either side in Spain.

Captain Sir William Brass: Would it not be possible to have these ships that go into these ports in Spain armed with our latest anti-aircraft pompoms, so as to be able to fight when these attacks take place?

The Prime Minister: It is a matter for the owners of the ships.

Mr. Wedgwood Benn: In view of the doubt in the Prime Minister's mind as to the origin of these machines, and in view of the fact that two of the captains of the ships, one of whom was bombed deliberately, according to the Government's statement—Captain Jones—are here, will the right hon. Gentleman receive these two captains, who are here now, and for a few minutes hear what they have to say?

The Prime Minister: The right lion. Gentleman spoke of the origin of these machines, but that is not the question which was put to me, which was as to the ownership of the machines, which is an entirely different matter.

Mr. Benn: These captains, one of whom, Captain Jones, has war service, and Captain Llewellyn, are here, or will be in a few minutes, and can the Prime Minister spare five minutes to hear their story?

The Prime Minister: I see no reason why I should not hear them. If they wish to see me, I shall be very pleased to see them.

Mr. Attlee: I beg to state that at the end of Questions I shall ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House in order to call attention to a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely, the attacks made yesterday upon British ships and their crews, and the refusal of His Majesty's Government either to afford adequate protection or to take measures to prevent their recurrence.

CHANCELLOR OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER.

Mr. Attlee: (by Private Notice) asked (fie Prime Minister whether he will make a statement as to the work which will in future be carried out by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in addition to the work of his present office?

The Prime Minister: In view of the volume and importance of the work connected with Air-Raid Precautions, it is desirable that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department should be in a position to devote practically the whole of his time to assisting the Home Secretary in the conduct of this large branch of Home Office business, especially at the present time when the building up throughout the country of this new service raises many problems of policy and administration. To enable this arrangement to be made, I am glad to announce that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has agreed to help the Home Secretary with his other work. For this purpose the Chancellor of the Duchy, while continuing to carry out the duties of his own office, will be specially attached to the Home Department, and will assist the Home Secretary in the Department and in the House of Commons.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

Mr. Attlee: May I ask the Prime Minister whether he will state the business for next week?

The Prime Minister: —Monday and Tuesday, conclusion of the Committee stage of the Finance Bill.
Wednesday, and until 7.30 p.m. on Thursday, Report and Third Reading of the Bacon Industry Bill.
After 7.30 p.m. on Thursday, Second Reading of the Supreme Court of Judica-

ture (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill, and Committee stage of the necessary Money Resolution.
If there is an opportunity during the early part of the week, we hope to take the Third Reading of the Essential Commodities Reserves Bill and of the Imperial Telegraphs Bill.
The business for Friday will be announced later.
On any day, if there is time, other Orders may be taken.

Mr. Attlee: May I ask whether the Essential Commodities Reserves Bill and the Imperial Telegraphs Bill will be taken after Eleven o'clock?

The Prime Minister: No, Sir, not after Eleven o'clock.

Mr. Buchanan: May I ask a question about to-morrow, when we are to take the Ministry of Labour Vote? The right hon. Gentleman is aware that that Vote covers a very wide field, and could he give any guidance, for those of us who are interested, as to what subjects are to be discussed to-morrow? Is it the Unemployment Assistance Board's Report, or is it the general administration of unemployment insurance? If the right hon. Gentleman could guide us on that matter, it would be a convenience to some of us who are not in the bigger parties and do not, therefore, know the arrangements that have been made.

The Prime Minister: I think both of those subjects will be in order on this Vote to-morrow.

Mr. Buchanan: Then am I to understand that the whole of the Unemployment Assistance Board Vote, which includes questions of family allowance, under-feeding, etc., is to be discussed in a matter of less than five hours?

The Prime Minister: That is a matter for arrangement through the usual channels. The questions can always be arranged.

BILL PRESENTED.

IMPORTATION OF PLUMAGE (PROHIBITION) ACT (1921) AMENDMENT BILL,

"to amend the Importation of Plumage (Prohibition) Act, 1921,"presented by Mr. Mathers; supported by Viscountess Astor, Mr. Barr, Mr. S. O. Davies, Mr. Grenfell, Mr. Kingsley Griffith, Mr. Groves, Mr. Lewis, Miss Rathbone, and Dr. Summerskill; to be read a Second time upon Tuesday next, and to be printed. [Bill 193.]

PRIVATE LEGISLATION PROCEDURE (SCOTLAND) ACT, 1936.

Copy presented of Report by the Chairman of Committees of the House of Lords and the Chairman of Ways and Means in the House of Commons, under Section 2 of the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act, 1936, that they are of opinion (I) that the following Orders, namely, the Aberdeen Corporation Order, so far as Clauses 214 and 215 are concerned, and the Glasgow Corporation Order, so far as Clause 7 is concerned, raise questions of public policy of such novelty and importance that they ought to be dealt with by Private Bill and not by Provisional Order; (2) that, save as aforesaid, the Provisional Orders be allowed to proceed, subject to such recommendations as they may hereafter make with respect to the several Orders [by Act]; to lie upon the Table.

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.

That they have agreed to,—

Leasehold Property (Repairs) Bill, without Amendment.

Housing (Agricultural Population) (Scotland) Bill, with an Amendment.

Street Playgrounds Bill.

Children and Young Persons Bill, with Amendments.

Amendment to their Amendment to—

Housing (Rural Workers) Amendment Bill, without Amendment.

Amendments to—

Manchester Corporation Bill [Lords]

Plymouth Extension Bill [Lords],

Wakefield Corporation Bill [Lords], without Amendment.

That they have passed a Bill, intituled,

"An Act to consolidate with amendments certain enactments relating to food, drugs, markets, slaughter-houses and knackers' yards." [Food and Drugs Bill [Lords]

HOUSING (AGRICULTURAL POPULATION) (SCOTLAND) BILL.

Lords Amendment to be considered on Monday next, and to be printed, [Bill 191.]

STREET PLAYGROUNDS BILL.

Lords Amendments to be considered upon Tuesday next, and to be printed. [Bill 192.]

BILLS REPORTED.

WEST MIDLANDS JOINT ELECTRICITY AUTHORITY PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.

Reported, without Amendment, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills; to be read the Third time To-morrow.

PIER AND HARBOUR PROVISIONAL ORDER (PLYMOUTH) BILL.

Reported, with Amendments, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

Bill, as amended, to be considered Tomorrow.

IPSWICH CORPORATION (TROLLEY VEHICLES) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.

Reported, without Amendment, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills; to be read the Third time To-morrow.

NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE CORPORATION (TROLLEY VEHICLES) PROVISIONAL ORDER BILL.

Reported, without Amendmnt, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills; to be read the Third time To-morrow.

HARWICH HARBOUR BILL [Lords].

Reported, with Amendments, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

Bill, as amended, to lie upon the Table.

SHROPSHIRE, WORCESTERSHIRE AND STAFFORDSHIRE ELECTRIC POWER CONSOLIDATION BILL [Lords].

Reported, with Amendments, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills (with Report on the Bill).

Bill, as amended, and Report to lie upon the Table; Report to be printed.

CANTERBURY GAS AND WATER BILL.

Reported, with Amendments, from the Committee on Unopposed Bills.

Bill, as amended, to lie upon the Table.

WELSH CHURCH (AMENDMENT) BILL [Lords]

Reported, without Amendment, from the Select Committee (with Minutes of Evidence).

Bill re-committed to a Committee of the Whole House for Monday next.

Minutes of Evidence to lie upon the Table, and to be printed. [No. 143.]

DUTIES ON MOTOR CARS, MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS, CLOCKS, FILMS, ETC.

"That—

(1) as from the twentieth day of August, nineteen hundred and thirty-eight, Section three of the Finance Act, 1925 (which imposes duties of Customs on motor cars, musical instruments, clocks, films, &amp;c.), and any other enactment which amends or expressly relates to that Section, shall cease to have effect;
 (2) the Treasury shall by order direct that, as from the said date, there shall be charged under Section three of the Import Duties Act, 1932, on all goods which immediately before the said date were chargeable with a duty of Customs under Section three of the Finance Act, 1925, an additional duty of such an amount as will, with the general ad valorem duty, amount to the rate of duty so chargeable thereon immediately before that date;
 (3) any such order shall be deemed to have been made under the Import Duties Act, 1932, but for the purposes of Section nineteen of that Act shall be deemed not to be an order imposing a duty of Customs;
 (4) Section five of the Import Duties Act, 1932, and Section two of the Ottawa Agreements Act, 1932 (which relate to Imperial preference), shall not apply to any such goods as aforesaid, but all such goods which, but for this provision, would be exempt from the general ad valorem duty and any additional duty shall, as from the said date, be charged with those duties at the preferential rate of two-thirds of the full rate."

Resolution agreed to.

Ordered,

"That it be an Instruction to the Committee on the Finance Bill that they have power to make provision therein pursuant to the said Resolution."

FINANCE BILL.

Considered in Committee [Progress, 22nd June.]

[Sir DENNIS HERBERT in the Chair.]

CLAUSE 5.—(Increased customs duties on tea.)

Amendment proposed [22nd June]: In page 5, line 16, to leave out "increased." —(Mr. Barnes.)

Question against proposed, "That the word increased ' stand part of the Clause."

3.59 P.m.

Mr. Sexton: I have very great pleasure in supporting this Amendment. I have taken the trouble to analyse the Amendments on yesterday's Order Paper, and I find that there were 115 altogether, of which 19 were proposed by the party to which I belong, 83 by the Government, and 13 by the Liberal party. By far the larger number of the Amendments deal with people like motorists, bondholders, and manufacturers, and only a small number are concerned with the food and the welfare of the workers of this country. The Chancellor cannot complain of Members on these benches when they put down so few Amendments to his Finance Bill. During the Debate yesterday no Government supporter spoke in favour of this Tea Duty. We on the Labour benches have not been silent, and do not intend to be silent on such an important subject. It has been said by hon. Members opposite that the amount of the duty on tea is too insignificant for us to make a fuss about it, yet it is significant enough to cause a display of obstinacy on the part of the Government, who refuse to withdraw it.
Clause 5, to which this Amendment refers, affects the food of the people The first three Amendments discussed yesterday affected the food of the machine; reductions were wanted on food for machines. This Amendment is directed to a reduction of taxation on the food of the human beings of the country, especially those of the poorer classes. Tea is not a luxury. That has been said scores of times, but it needs emphasising. To the workers, especially the lower paid workers, and those with small fixed incomes, and pensioners, tea is an absolute necessity, and indeed it is a form of food. The Amendment will tend to reduce the cost of living and the money so saved will enable the poorer classes to buy more food. A widow with three children in my constituency has the magnificent sum of 19s. a week on which to live. Of that sum 5s. goes in rent, light and coals, she pays 2s. a week to a clothing club, and she is left with 12s. a week, 144 pence, for 112 meals, or less than ¼ a meal. She tells me that she uses about ¾ of tea a week. This increased tax will increase her cost of living by 1½. That may seem a very small sum, but it means that in that family someone has to go one meal short a week, and in


most cases of the kind it is the mother who goes short in order that the children may get their full share. As in the case of this widow, so in the case of the old age pensioner. The Government have refused constantly to raise the amount of the pension. It is disgraceful to add to the cost of living by this imposition of an increased Tea Duty.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his Budget speech, referred to the pride and patriotism of these poor people. Pride in what? Pride in the 10s. for a mother or 3s. for a child? What about the patriotism, the love of fatherland without the care of a father, the love of a fatherland which includes the fatherless and the widows, in increasing their cost of living? These poor people must do their duty by paying this duty, I suppose. It is implied that the money will go to assist rearmament. I take it that this duty is not allocated to one specific expenditure. Part of the widow's mite will go towards the Civil List, to pay big pensions to wealthy widows in high places. Part of it will go to children of the Palace, part of the old age pensioners' and ex-service men's pensions will go to pay retiring pensions to Army and Navy officers, not on the scale of old age pensions, but on a far grander scale than that. Part of it will pay judges and Cabinet Ministers and Members of Parliament. What pride will these oppressed folks feel when they drink tea to the popinjays of the Palace and to statesmen whose statecraft savours more of craftiness than of statesmanship? What patriotism is there in the Flag which has now become practically the shroud of bombed British sailors, and has become a shroud to cover the shame of the nation in dealing so despicably with its poorer subjects by adding to their existing burdens? With pleasure I again voice my opinion that the Government have sunk to very low depths indeed when they try to extract from the poorer section of the community this extra tax.

4.7 p.m.

Mr. Lewis: It is a curious thing how mere size will affect some people's standard of morality. For example, a man who would not dream of cheating a poor tradesman will sometimes not hesitate to try to travel first-class with a third-class railway ticket, apparently with the vague idea that the railway company is so big and rich and powerful that his action really

does not matter. In the same way some people, whose ordinary standard of commercial morality is beyond suspicion, do not hesitate, if they take a holiday in France, to endeavour on their return to smuggle some small article through the Customs, knowing that duty should be paid upon it. Again, the idea is that the country is so strong and wealthy that their action does not matter. In these attacks on the Tea Duty we see something of the same kind. We see a number of hon. Members who would, I am sure, do anything they could to prevent an individual from seeking means, by some loophole in the law, to evade taxation which this House sought to impose upon him. Those same Members come down here and eagerly endeavour to ensure that whole classes of the community shall evade a reasonable share of taxation.
After all, what is the position with which the Chancellor is faced? We all know that he has to meet some extra expenditure because of the acceleration of our rearmament programme, and that he is obliged to provide extra taxation to cover that expenditure. He has endeavoured to do rough justice in the matter by placing some of the burden on direct taxation and part of it on indirect taxation. In selecting the object for indirect taxation he has deliberately chosen something which is as widely used as possible. To me that seems a very reasonable proposal, and one which we might well accept. I noticed that in the Debate yesterday the hon. Member for East Ham, South (Mr. Barnes) threw out the suggestion that, supposing it was desirable to raise part of this money by indirect taxation, there might be other forms of indirect taxation which would be more desirable from the point of view of public policy. That seems to me to be a perfectly arguable proposition, one on which many views might be held; but that is not the attitude taken up by the great majority of those who oppose the duty and support this Amendment.
The speeches of hon. Members opposite show that in essence their objection is to any increase at the present time in any form of indirect taxation. That is the claim they make and that is the purpose of the Amendment. Some of them have used very strong language in support of the Amendment. One hon. Member yesterday referred to the tax as mean and despicable. It is an old


dodge, if you feel a little uncertain as to the merits of your case, to devote yourself to abusing the other man's lawyer. When I hear hon. Members opposite use violent language about the tax I cannot help wondering whether it is not because they are a little uneasy as to the arguments they bring forward. In some ways there is a rather striking parallel between this opposition to an increase of the Tea Duty and what occurred in 1931. In 1931 Members of the Labour party went to the country and appealed to all the most selfish instincts of mankind, ignoring all sense of public duty. The country very decisively rejected the arguments they put forward, and as a party they were very badly beaten. I venture to suggest that public opinion has not greatly changed, and that Members of the Labour party are deluding themselves if they suppose that there is any widespread support for the proposal that all the extra burden for rearmament, rearmament in the interests of us all, should be borne by one small section of the community, and that section one which already bears by far the largest share of taxation. I hope that the Chancellor will stand firm in his resistance to the Amendment.

4.14 p.m.

Mr. Maxton: I have been called to my feet by the tone and content of the utterance of the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis). He appealed for indirect taxation to be imposed upon the poor and made a plea for what he calls the already overtaxed small section of the rich. I understand that that was the general conclusion of his oration. He suggested that if any hon. Member here gets up and opposes indirect taxation of the pernicious kind that the tax on tea is, he is committing an act which is comparable with cheating a railway company or the Customs. The Chancellor of the Exchequer comes forward with a series of proposals for raising the necessary revenue of the country, but if I come forward and oppose any one of the suggestions on behalf of a particular section of the community that I think is already overburdened, I am told that I am engaging in something that is immoral and criminal. I am not going to accept that from the hon. Member. I object profoundly to the Tea Duty. At one time there was in this country a very strong and healthy opinion that no article that was an article of dietary of the people

should ever bear taxation. I still hold that view.
It is true that a heavy drinker of tea like myself can well afford to pay the taxation and I would never grumble at having to pay it. But what the hon. Member is asking is that a man living on 15s. a week, and possibly a means-tested 15s. at that, should shoulder a burden to relieve the small section of Income Tax and Super-tax payers for whom the hon. Member speaks; and he says that if I stand here and say that this man should not have this imposition put on him and that his interests in the defence of the country are not the same as those of the man who has a stake in the country, I am cheating. Some extraordinary examples of the patriotism of those who have a stake in the country have come to our notice in the last few weeks. My hon. Friend the Member for Shettleston (Mr. McGovern) had a question down to the Chancellor this week. The hon. Member for Colchester talks about evasion. The manner of the Chancellor in answering that question reached the highest realms of astute evasion. It was a question which brought out the fact that the Duke of Devonshire who, until a week or two ago was a Member of the Government—

The Chairman: The hon. Member must not go into that question at length.

Mr. Maxton: I am replying to the hon. Member on the question of evasion. He talked about Customs evasion, railway cheating and sundry other forms of fraud, and accused the hon. Member who moved the Amendment and those of us who are supporting it of being guilty of a crime comparable to those. I am defending a reduction in the Tea Duty on behalf of the poor sections of the community, and I am saying that in doing that I am doing a decent, clean parliamentary duty. I am pointing out to the hon. Member that he is defending and supporting the real big evasions and cheatings of wealthy people with a real stake in the country who are being maintained by the poor people who are paying the tea tax. Once the law is made—not when it is still a matter for discussion and when Amendments can be proposed—but when it has become the law, these people hire the best legal opinion they can get, and say, "Now this is the law; this is the way taxation is imposed. It is going to bear heavily upon


us. Will you please give us the benefit of your brain power to see how we can evade our national responsibilities?" The hon. Member gets up to speak on their behalf and against the poor fellow who is just struggling to live, and no more. Remember that the average Income Tax payer has an income of £5 a week before he starts to pay any tax at all, ten times the income of the fellow for whom I am speaking and on whom the hon. Member is trying to shove the extra tea tax. Above £5 he is asked to return only something like one-quarter of his superfluity.
The Chancellor, when he is up in the realms of £1,000,000,000 a year, when he is thinking in terms of hundreds of millions by taxation from this and hundreds of millions from the next thing, could well have spared the poorest of the poor this imposition. Tea, in general, is the drink of the poorest of the poor. It is a food to them; it is the little something that makes their mean and miserable bread and margarine meals palatable. Day by day they have these meals, for the family income does not allow for the variety in meals which better-paid people can have. To the big mass of the people tea is the one thing that enables them to continue living and to derive a certain amount of satisfaction from their miserable foodstuffs. If the Income Tax payer had been called upon to bear the amount which the extra Tea Duty will produce, it would have meant only an extra penny in the £ It would have been only an act of decency for them to have paid that extra penny in order to relieve the poorest of the poor of this tax.

4.24 p.m.

Mr. A. Jenkins: I was very distressed to listen to the speech of the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis), because it totally disregarded the very large section of the people who are poor. There is no reason why this additional tax should he imposed on tea. I consider that there should be no tea tax at all and there is certainly no justification for an increase. I feel sure that the Chancellor does not believe what he said in his Budget Speech about poor people being pleased to make some contribution to the expenses of rearmament. When there is already an insufficiency in the household arid a tax is imposed which takes something out of the household,

there can be no joy in paying. This amount could easily be raised by Income Tax, for an extra penny would produce about £4,000,000. The homes which will be taxed by the extra Tea Duty will be the homes of the old age pensioner, the unemployed, the army pensioner and the people of low wages. Tea is the only drink of those poor homes and I could wish that the Chancellor knew them better than he apparently does. There was a time when I believed he understood working-class homes.
What happens in the poorest homes? In the morning for breakfast it is tea, bread and margarine and, maybe, a little jam. When the children come home from school they have the same diet. It is almost the same diet every day. The hon. Member for Oxford University (Sir A. Salter), speaking on this subject last night, spoke of this tax as a sort of inverted graduated Income Tax which is contrary to all practice. That is precisely what it is. It is a tax upon our poorest homes and there is no justification for it. The Chancellor has not advanced one sound argument in favour of it. My hon. Friend the Member for Barnard Castle (Mr. Sexton) carried out some analyses of the cost of meals in the poorest homes. I have worked out hundreds of these family budgets, and in a large percentage of the families on unemployment benefit—the 15s. a week families—the average cost of the meals is from¼. to 2d. per person. The Chancellor says that this tax is a small one and will not have much effect. In the average working-class home, where the breadwinner is unemployed and the income is unemployment benefit or unemployment assistance, it will mean that 30 meals will have to disappear in a year and the family will have to live on something less than they are living on at the present time. Can the Chancellor justify taking certain meals away from these families? The Minister of Labour and the Unemployment Assistance Board have done everything in their power to cut the family income down to the lowest possible level. Then the Chancellor comes along and imposes a tax of 25 per cent. on the tea consumption of the home. It is violation of all the best canons of taxation.
Taxation should be raised on people who can afford to bear it. Income Tax payers, generally speaking, never go


short of a meal or of home comforts. They sacrifice very little indeed, and if they sacrifice anything at all it is some kind of luxury. They cannot afford quite as expensive a motor car, or live in quite as big a house, or the grounds attached to the house cannot be as extensive—those are the effects upon the Income Tax and Super-tax payers; but in the poor homes, the Chancellor of the Exchequer is taking away 30 meals every year, and I ask him not to blot his Budget by an act of that kind. In those poor homes tea is the only beverage. In middle-class and upper-class homes tea is a variant of other and more expensive drinks, it is merely taken occasionally, never as a regular beverage, but it is a vital necessity in working class homes. The Chancellor cannot tell us that he has to impose this tax because of need, and therefore he cannot tell us that it is a just tax. I should like to have heard him say, as one would have expected him to say some years ago, "We will do what we can to make the poorest of our homes as free from poverty as we can." On the contrary, the imposition of this tax will make poverty a little more intense in the poorest of our homes. I hope the Chancellor will give heed to what we have said.

4.32 p.m.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir William Allen: I have been wondering whether there is any use in making an appeal to the Chancellor from this side of the Committee. This is one of the few occasions that we from Northern Ireland have of taking any part in the Debates here, because this is a matter which interests us just as much as it interests the working people in this country. I will admit that people over there drink more than tea, but that state of affairs is not confined to my part of the country. While listening to the Debate I could not help thinking of the people whom I represent—after all, I must consider them sometimes. I feel that rearmament was necessary, and I consider that all classes of the community ought to contribute towards the cost of it, but when we are making a collection of £1,000,000,000 this extra contribution from tea seems a miserable item.
I represent a constituency which is largely composed of the working class. I suppose that of all the votes polled at my election 95 per cent. were working-class votes. I come from a little town of

13,000 inhabitants, and I believe that in that town there is more unemployment than in any other town in the Kingdom. There are 3,600 people unemployed out of the 13,000, or between 5o and 6o per cent. of those on the registers. It is for those people that I want to appeal to the Chancellor. At present there is an appalling state of unemployment, but we hope that conditions will eventually improve, because it is largely on account of the war in China and in Spain and of the difficulties in America that our people are suffering. They are employed almost entirely in the linen industry which ordinarily ships millions of yards of linen a year to China and the United States. Those countries are not now in a position to take those goods and to pay. How long that state of affairs will last I do not know, but as long as it does our people will be unemployed.
If the Chancellor of the Exchequer happened to come to the town and tell those unemployed people "Now, you will be glad to make this contribution of 2d. more upon tea for the sake of the rearmament of the country," I wonder what they would say? One of the mysterious things about humanity is how the poor constantly help one another. There are some people in that town who are employed, perhaps 40 per cent., and they are helping the unemployed, but not only do we tax the unemployed: we tax the employed who are helping the unemployed. I cannot help thinking that there is some other way by which this £3,000,000 could be collected than by taking it from the working class. Of course, other people beside the working class drink tea, but 95 per cent. of my constituents are working people, and I suppose there is not a Member in this House who does not depend upon the working class to return him to one side of this House or the other.
Here is an opportunity for the greatness of the Chancellor of the Exchequer to make itself manifest. He has listened to a great many speeches. Is there any possibility of him answering the appeal from this—or the other—side of the House? I do not think this is a time for extravagant language, but for plain talking. There are the poor; there is the unemployment; there is the tax. Can those people pay it? It is only robbing them of a little more of what they daily consume, because with them it is tea in


the morning, tea at dinner-time, tea in the afternoon and tea at night.
When the Chancellor made his Budget speech and announced this addition to the Tea Duty I said to myself "What a stupendous blunder." I was not at all surprised at the addition to the Income Tax. Three weeks before I had been asked in Belfast "What do you think of the prospects?" and I had said "I have no doubt whatever of another 6d. on the Income Tax," but I never dreamed of such a stupendous blunder as this additional Tea Duty. I believe it is a tax which the Chancellor can very well do without. I believe that the receipts from Income Tax will exceed his Budget estimate by that £3,000,000 because enormous profits are being made at the moment, and if he had faith in the conditions of employment in certain trades in the coming year I believe that he would agree that he would be able to do without this tax.
When I heard of this tax I said to myself—and I have been saying it almost every day since—that it was a tax which was imposed by people who are themselves in safe employment and not by the Chancellor of the Exchequer at all. It was suggested by people who want to make things easy for themselves. I repeat that it is a tax suggested by those who give the Chancellor advice and who have to collect the taxes who are themselves in safe positions and do not want to take any more trouble. It is a lazy permanent officials' tax. That is my opinion. There are dozens of other ways in which the money could be raised. Why will not the Chancellor yield to our appeals? There is no question of politics here, no question of personal aggrandisement, no question of whether this side or that wants to score on this subject. It is a question of humanity and common sense. I hope that in the end the Chancellor will see his way to tell us, after all the appeals which have been made to him, that he has seen his way to collect this money in some other way.

4.42 p.m.

Mr. Woods: I hope that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he is not moved by the appeals from this side of the Committee, will respond to the very moving and human appeal which we have just heard from the hon. and gallant Member

for Armagh (Sir W. Allen). I am sure the whole nation will sympathise with the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the stupendous task of raising the money under a Budget of such magnitude, but I am equally certain that this trifling sum of £3,000,000, to be raised by a substantial increase in the tax upon tea, has moved the conscience of the nation more deeply than any other item in the Budget. I am certain that the hon. and gallant Member for Armagh was not speaking merely for himself or his constituents but was voicing the best feelings and thoughts of all his fellow countrymen, not only in Northern Ireland but in England, Scotland and Wales. A very considerable percentage of those who will pay this tax will have no sense of loss at all; it will make not a scrap of difference to them, but we have to remember that there are still 1,750,000 unemployed, and that there are many old people who have given a whole lifetime of service to their country and are now having to perform every week a much more difficult task than the Chancellor of the Exchequer has to perform once a year. They have to perform what is practically a miracle every week of their lives. The conditions of the unfortunate and substantial minority of the population who will have to pay this tax will be made even more hard. I, therefore, hope that if the Chancellor of the Exchequer will not listen to the appeals which have been made to him, he will listen to the sense of the country and will not harden his heart. If the Chancellor were to forego this £3,000,000 he would not lose in prestige; he would gain considerably in respect in the country, and the country would be no poorer. As has been suggested, there are many ways in which this amount might be found.
The morning after the speech in which the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced this increase I was in the home of an aged couple, both over 80 years of age, and the subject under discussion between myself and those aged pensioners was naturally the Budget. I was faced with the question from the old lady: "Why have the Government done this?" I ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer to put himself in my position and try to answer that human and fundamental question. Happily I did not have to apologise for the Government, and I said that I did not know why the Government had done it. I said I did not think


it was a sensible tax, but I had the idea that the Chancellor was trying to realise part of the vast sum required for armaments expenditure and, being a good debater, he wanted to be able to reply to those whose Income Tax he had increased by pointing to the tax on tea and saying that he was making everybody pay. The one generous feature of the Budget was the increase from 10 per cent. to 20 per cent. in the allowance for wear and tear of machinery. Industrialists have been treated well by successive Governments and many millions of pounds have been put into their pockets. The doubling of the allowance is a very generous action on the part of the Chancellor. If he had been as generous to the millions of poor people whose major beverage is tea he would have shown a better sense of balance. It is not too late for him to say that the big industrialists will have to be satisfied with a 50 per cent. increase in the allowance for wear and tear, leaving them with an allowance of 15 per cent. The reduction would more than wipe out the £3,000,000 which it is hoped to get from tea.
Only two speeches on this subject have been made from the benches opposite. One was sympathetic to the Amendment and the other was a side-tracking speech which went into the question of abuses and evasions. I noticed that the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis) accused those who spoke from this side of the House of using the words "despicable and mean" to describe this tax, yet the same hon. Member proceeded to abuse the whole of this party and practically the whole population of this country by accusing them of attempting wilfully to deceive and defraud railway companies and the State. I do not think that contribution from the other side gives the Chancellor of the Exchequer much encouragement to persevere with this tax. I am certain that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has no illusions concerning the artificiality of the distinction made between direct and indirect taxation. Anybody who knows business and finance will be aware that a considerable volume of the revenue raised by direct taxation can be passed back to the consuming public. Furthermore, very much of the legislation of this Government has been aimed at giving security to all kinds of industries, especially agriculture, and the effects

are filtering back to the consuming public. The consumers have to pay more than their proportion towards the tremendous cost of armaments.
One argument seems to have been omitted. This tax is not merely an injustice to a considerable percentage of the population but it is unsound and unwise, in present circumstances. It is not only directly unjust, but it is a form of legislation which aggravates the major evil of our time—poverty. We all know that there are people who are unable to purchase what they require because they have not the money with which to do so. That position results in widespread unemployment, under-production and under-consumption. The £3,000,000 is a small item; it is the principle of the thing about which I am concerned. Practically the whole of that sum would, in the normal course of events, go in purchasing power, increasing the volume of demand which, in turn, would increase production and distribution and stimulate the circulation of currency. The argument may be used that the prevailing low interest rates indicate that there are vast accumulations, but if this £3,000,000 were not taken from the consuming public it would remain in circulation. The typical old age pensioner, unemployed person and low-wage earner spend, week by week, practically all their earnings in purchasing commodities, mostly of home production. Only by increasing the purchasing power of those people and of the whole population will it be possible to reduce the numbers of the unemployed, increase the effective demand for goods, and increase the wealth of the country. I make my last appeal to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that, in view of the effect it would have upon the nation and in view of the principles he has advocated in the past, he should accept this Amendment for the abolition of the proposed increase in the tax on tea.

4.56 p.m.

Sir Alfred Law: When I spoke on this subject before I remember that I was called to order several times and was not able to go on with my points. This Amendment gives me another opportunity of saying what I wanted to say on this point. The Chancellor of the Exchequer thinks that this is quite a proper tax, and it is true that 2d. makes very little difference to a large number of people; but thousands of people will feel even this very small impost. I should not be


against the tax on tea if I did not see that there are other means of raising the money. I am rather surprised that the Chancellor of the Exchequer could not find other ways than by taxing the poor people's tea. For example, there has never been any tax upon bicycles, and such a tax, at 2s. 6d., would probably produce £1,000,000. I rather object to the increase in the allowance for wear and tear of machinery. I happen to be a manufacturer myself, and I never looked for this increase in the allowance. If the Chancellor did not proceed with that increase he would have the money, and would not need the proposed increased taxation on tea. It has been suggested to me that a tax upon football coupons would bring in an enormous sum. I hope that when the Chancellor of the Exchequer has considered the whole thing he will find himself able to get the money by other means than by putting this extra 2d. a lb. on tea.

4.58 p.m.

Mr. Pearson: It appeared inexplicable to the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis), when he intervened in this Debate, that we sometimes use what he termed extravagant language in our condemnation of this tea tax, but if he will think of the millions of people who actually have to live upon money that is not sufficient to keep their bodies properly nourished, as is admitted by all nutritional experts, he will understand why we use extravagant language. The tea tax is admittedly small, but it takes £3,000,000 out of the pockets of the population, and that money would be better spent in other directions. We admit that the Chancellor of the Exchequer has a tremendous task to find all these hundreds of millions of pounds for rearmament, which presently will go up to thousands of millions, but let us remember that that burden percolates down to the people who have exceedingly small incomes. It is the accumulation of little extras that breaks the back of these people. I hope that the conduct of this Committee is not to be measured by the meanness of this tax, because there is no argument for it at all.
We are very glad to have had a couple of speeches from the other side of the Committee appealing to the Chancellor to take off the increase in the Tea Duty.

They are like a glimmer of sunshine through the darkness. I hope that the hon. Members who spoke will go into the Division Lobby and support us if the Chancellor of the Exchequer will not accede to the very sincere appeals that have been made this afternoon by several speakers. The tea tax is to be condemned because it has no regard at all to the ability of large numbers of people upon whom it falls to pay it. I join with the other appeals which have been made to the Chancellor of the Exchequer to be big enough to withdraw this increase in the Tea Duty, and not to place a further burden upon people who are unable to bear the burdens which fall upon them at the present time.

5.0 p.m.

Mr. Gallacher: This tax has been condemned, and rightly condemned, because it is a tax of a very peculiar character. It is distinguished from all other taxes by the fact that, the poorer people are, the more they have to pay, and the Chancellor has never yet faced up to that fact. I have been very interested to hear some of the arguments that were served up in connection with this tax, and to note the confusion that exists as to who is paying for the maintenance of the country. I heard the independent Member for Oxford University (Sir A. Salter) say that he was not going to use as an argument the burden that this tax represented, because the Chancellor would point out that by comparison it did not mean a very large burden on those who have to bear it. It is easy enough for an hon. Member representing Oxford University to express the opinion that there is no weight in that argument, because he does not have to bear the burden, nor are those whom he represents bearing any serious burden; but for a considerable time I have been going round addressing meetings of old age pensioners under the auspices of the Scottish Old Age Pensioners' Association —meetings composed almost entirely of old age pensioners. They are demanding an increase of their pension from 10s. £I, because they cannot live on what they are getting at present. Their position in many cases is simply appalling, and for an hon. Member to get up here and say that there is no weight in that argument is simply to represent himself as a philistine with no concern for and no


knowledge of what is going on around him in the country.
Another argument which is continually being put forward, and which the Chancellor seems to consider to be in some way a justification for his action, is that, since he is putting on a considerable amount of direct taxation, he is entitled to put on something in the way of indirect taxation. He puts it in this way, that, when he is increasing the Income Tax and other forms of direct taxation, it is necessary to give everybody, even the poorest of the poor, an opportunity to contribute towards the maintenance of the armaments that are necessary to defend the country. Was there ever such a spurious, rubbishy argument as that? Take the case of one person, A, who is living on the bare necessities of life, and beyond that has nothing, and another person, B, who is living well and has £5. The Chancellor says that, if he puts a 50 per cent. tax on B's £5, and takes £2 10s. from him, he is entitled to put a tax of some kind on A, who has nothing. But is he? What does a tax on A mean? It means that he is going to be pushed down into debt, or that he will have to do without some of the necessities of life. It is obvious that there is no justification for putting a tax of any kind on A while B has any surplus at all. Wealth should be taken from those who have it before those who have nothing are forced down further into debt. There is no justification at all for taking this £3,000,000 on tea.
The matter becomes more serious when one considers that the £5 which B has has been taken from A. That is the actual position; the profits on which Income Tax is paid are taken from the people who have to pay the tax on tea. There is no source of profits anywhere but the labour of the masses of the workers, and it is from the workers that all this wealth is taken to which direct taxation is applied. That has been abundantly proven by the analysis of capitalism made by Karl Marx, and, if the Chancellor would give some attention to the study of Marx, he would probably be in a much better position to deal with the questions that confront him. It is clear that the only source of profits is the unpaid labour of the workers, that is to say, the difference between what is paid for the labour power of the workers

and the value of that which their labour power can produce. We have to come back to the question of taking this taxation from those who have, and of justifying the taking of it from those who have not. I want to lay down to the Chancellor, in connection with this tax on tea —and it applies also to other indirect taxes—the proposition that the working class has nothing, that the working class is in a condition of potential or chronic bankruptcy, and to suggest taxing the working class, even to the extent of £3,000,000, in these circumstances, cannot be justified at all.
I was talking the other day to a Front Bench Member about the situation that exists among the working class in Scotland, and the same applies in England as well. We have to face the hard and bitter fact that thousands of families are forced to go without adequate food. For instance, what is called an overcrowding and slum clearance scheme is going on. A family, consisting of a man, his wife and three children, are taken from an overcrowded house or a slum house, where the rent is very low, and ordered into a three-roomed house; and the rent which they have to pay is doubled or nearly trebled. The wages are small, and they have to pay this heavy rent. Moreover, when they are in a slum house or an overcrowded house, they have, as anyone who has seen these places can understand, no furniture to speak of; but when they go into the new three-roomed house they have to get some furniture. What happens? The instalment firms are there, and the house is filled up on the instalment plan. The people upon whom this tax is being imposed are simply not in a position to pay it, no matter how small it is. We have a saying in Scotland that "ilka mickle maks a muckle," and one has only to watch what 's happening in these housing schemes when the instalment men are going round to realise that most of these families cannot afford this extra tax. It is a scandal that any tax should be put on people who have nothing.
Of course I know that many hon. Members are in the habit of drawing attention to the fact that the workers have a great amount of savings—that they have so much in the savings bank, so much in the co-operative society, so much here and so much there. I am sure that, if the


hon. Member for South Croydon (Mr. H. G. Williams) were here, he would be able to tell us without a moment's hesitation how much the workers have in savings. But, when we are given the amount of assets that the workers have, we are not given the amount of their liabilities, and I am certain that, if at any moment you took the assets of the working class and the liabilities of the working class in the form of debts for rent, furniture, clothing, doctors and all the rest, you would find that their debts cancel out their assets, and that the workers are bankrupt. That being the case, the Chancellor can never in any circumstances justify putting any added taxation upon them.
I would ask him to answer two questions. First, is it a fact that this tax, as distinct from other taxes, bears the more heavily on people the poorer they are; and can he justify that? Secondly, I would ask him whether it is not the case at the present time that the people whom he is expecting to pay this tax are in the most urgent need, and that another burden upon them, however small it may be, means that something has to be sacrificed in order that the tax may be paid? From the point of view of equity, before you impose a burden on those who have nothing, who are living right on the poverty line, and in many cases under the poverty line, you should see to it that all the available cash which has been taken from them in the shape of profits is made use of for the purpose of meeting the demand upon you. I ask the Chancellor, as Members on his own side have asked him, to reconsider this additional tax on tea and to withdraw it. There are many other sources from which he can get the £3,000,000, and, if he accedes to this request, he will be refraining from committing a serious injustice against the mass of the people of this country.

The Chairman: Captain Euan Wallace.

Mr. Tinker: On a point of Order. Seeing that some of us have been sitting here for two or three hours awaiting an opportunity to speak, I would like to ask whether this means closing the Debate now?

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Captain Euan Wallace): Further on the point of Order, may I point out that,

when the hon. Member for Pontypridd (Mr. Pearson) resumed his seat, the only hon. Member who rose was the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher)?

Mr. Tinker: I rose at the same time, but the hon. Member for West Fife asked me to give him precedence, as he was very anxious to speak, and I sat down immediately.

Captain Wallace: With your permission, Sir Dennis, I am perfectly willing to give way to hon. Members opposite; I rose only because I thought that the hon. Member for West Fife was the only other Member who wanted to speak.

The Chairman: Hon. Members who know anything of the procedure of the House will know that the Debate cannot be closed in that way.

5.15 p.m.

Mr. Tinker: I see that it was a misunderstanding, but one feels somewhat aggrieved at sitting here for hours and then being cut out. We have dealt with this matter on a number of occasions, and now we are making a last appeal to the Chancellor to consider it again in the light of what has been said from various parts of the Committee. I was very impressed by the speech of the hon. and gallant Member for Armagh (Sir W. Allen). He put it as well as anybody could put it —why the Chancellor should consider this from the point of view of the masses of the people. It is accepted by every Member that the money has to be found, but we say that the burden should be put on the shoulders of those better able to bear it than the ordinary wage-earner, the unemployed person and a number of people who have very small means. The poorer the people, the more they turn to tea as a means of quenching their thirst. In every wage-earning household I know, tea is the chief drink. They have tea at practically every meal. So the burden falls disproportionately on those families. I want the Chancellor to have in mind what this tax means to the ordinary householder. It has been pointed out by hon. Members that it would mean about lid. a week for a household of four. That is out of all proportion.
I take it the Chancellor had it in mind that the amount he required would be evenly distributed over the whole population, but he will find that the £3,000,000


comes in greater proportion from a minority of the people. The hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis) said that about 35,000,000 in the land drink tea. Out of that 35,000,000, 10,000,000 or 12,000,000—what I term, the wage-earning classes—use more tea than the rest; and therefore the taxation falls with greater severity on them than on the rest of the 35,000,000. If the Chancellor really believes what he said in his Budget speech, that everybody desires to contribute to the rearmament of the country, why should he put the burden on a class which cannot meet it out of the income they have? We on this side can visualise various sections of the community: the unemployed, the old age pensioner, the low wage-earners, and what it means to them to have to meet this taxation.
When it is realised that this £3,000,000 means increasing the taxation on tea by 30 per cent.—an increase from £7,000,000 to £10,000,000—it will be seen that the increase is proportionally greater than that in connection with any other tax dealt with in the present financial statement. That is what ought to be borne in mind by the defenders of the tax. Even the increase in the Income Tax is not comparable to this. Income Tax will be increased by about 10 per cent., while this tax will be increased by 30 per cent.; and even then it is not distributed fairly. It is for these reasons that we are so anxious that the Chancellor should once again review the tax in the light of the appeals which have been made, not only from this side but from the other side of the Committee as well. It is not often that we are assisted on matters like this by hon. Members opposite, and it is rather gratifying to hear their pleas. They have used very mild language. The hon. Member for Colchester criticised this side of the Committee because my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. Silverman) used strong language last night. The reason for that strong language was not shortage of argument, but strong feeling. I thought my hon. Friend had not gone far enough.
The Chancellor has adopted methods which are mean and almost amount to viciousness in putting this burden on the working classes. It may be that there will not be any response from the people because they will have forgotten it when the time comes to record their votes again, but I shall do all I can to rouse

them against the Government which is trying to raise money in this way. Nobody would have missed another penny on the Income Tax. It would have been much better than asking the poor people to meet this burden. Dropping this tax would not mean unbalancing the Budget. I agree with the hon. Member who said that he thought the increased revenue coming from the Income Tax would more than compensate for the loss of this revenue. If the Chancellor would drop the tax his decision would meet with the approval of the great majority in this House. On the other hand, if he stands by the decision the party whip will crack and Members opposite will have to support his point of view. I trust he will not do that, but will listen to the appeal which has been made from all sides and say that he will withdraw the tax, trusting that the revenue will be forthcoming from other sources.

5.25 p.m.

Mr. Lipson: The hon. Member for Leigh (Mr. Tinker) has expressed gratification that two appeals have been made from this side to the Chancellor to review the position with regard to the increase of the Tea Duty. I am very glad to be able to add to his satisfaction by joining with those who have already spoken from this side of the Committee in opposition to the tax. I can assure the Chancellor that this is a matter which is causing a great deal of concern to Members of all parties and to people throughout the country, and that if he could see his way to respond to this appeal it would be a relief to a great majority of the Members of this Committee and would give general satisfaction. My attitude towards this duty has been quite clear from the start. I am opposed to it, and I am not afraid to say so and, if necessary, to vote accordingly. I am opposed to it on two grounds. In the first instance, I think it is unnecessary, and, secondly, I think it is undesirable. I regard this increase as unnecessary because I believe the Chancellor has under-estimated the amount of revenue he is going to receive in the coming year from the taxation he has imposed. I think it is wrong to, impose a burden on a great number of poor people who cannot afford to bear it, simply in order that there might be a surplus in the coming year. Also, it is unnecessary because if the Chancellor is not able to accept that view of the likely


revenue from the Budget, the money can be obtained in other ways.
Several alternatives have already been suggested. I will add that if the Chancellor had put a duty on cosmetics there would have been no Amendment in this House for its withdrawal, and it would have caused no ill-feeling. That is a better way of raising the small sum required than the method that the Chancellor has proposed. Those who would have to pay for it would be quite content to do so, and if they jibbed at it they would get precious little sympathy. They might also be called upon to bear their fair share of the cost of rearmament. Also, the Chancellor might have looked into the incidence of the tax on patent medicines, in order to see whether the revenue from that source is what it ought to be. I suggest that those two courses of raising money are more desirable than the method chosen by the Chancellor. This is an undesirable tax, because the only argument which I have heard advanced in its favour is that made by the Chancellor, that everybody in this country should be called upon to bear some share of the burden of the cost of rearmament. I say, with all respect, that his argument, so far as the very poor are concerned and so far as this particular tax is concerned, left me unconvinced and did not seem to me to ring true.
I know a great many of the very poor people in my own constituency; I know old age pensioners and low wage earners; and I am not going to give a vote for anything which is likely to add to the burden of their lot, already heavy enough. When I am asked to give a vote in this House I try to visualise how certain individuals I know personally and intimately are likely to be affected, and I say that the burden of this tax, which may seem small to some people, bears very heavily on an old age pensioner living on 10s. a week. Those people are extremely fortunate, in my constituency, if they can get a room to live in at 5s. a week, leaving only 5s. to meet all the other expenses of life. It is not fair to add to the expenses of these people. Therefore, I appeal to the Chancellor of the Exchequer to reconsider this matter in the light of the observations that have been made from various parts of the Committee. If he could see his way to with

draw this tax, or to say that he is prepared to reconsider it, I am sure that A would give general satisfaction, and so far from his position being weakened by an attitude of that kind, it would be very considerably strengthened.

5.31 p.m.

Captain Wallace: I think that anybody who has sat through the Debate upon this Amendment will realise that my right hon. Friend is most anxious to hear all arguments which may be put forward about this tax. I can assure the hon. Gentleman opposite that it was entirely unintentional—because I thought the Debate was finished—that I very nearly cut him out from contributing a speech which, as always happens in his case, was not marred by any over-statement either of fact or of language. The discussion upon the Tea Duty is a hardy annual in the Mother of Parliaments, and it invariably provokes from different parts of the House speeches of great sincerity, obviously inspired by a close and intimate knowledge of the circumstances of the people upon whom indirect taxation of necessity presses most hardly.
Although the Chairman has allowed a general discussion on the Clause, the precise Amendment with which we are dealing is the one moved by the hon. Gentleman the Member for East Ham, South (Mr. Barnes). A tribute has been paid to him already for the speech he made, and I should like to endorse it. I do not object to a single word he said last night. I am going to try to deal with this difficult question of the Tea Duty without any appeal to sentiment, passion or prejudice, but simply upon the cold facts—and they are cold facts—of which the Committee ought to be aware before hon. Members decide into which Lobby they will walk in a short time. The hon. Gentleman the Member for East Ham, South, whose proposal would, in fact, lose to my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer £5,500,000 this year, made the point that the sum of 3,000,000, at which he put it down, was not material in a Budget of £1,000,000,000. But even the sum of 3,000,000, much more £5,500,000, is an appreciable element in the £30,000,000 which the Chancellor of the Exchequer has to raise by extra taxation this year; and of that £30,000,000 I would remind


the Committee that £22,250,000 is being collected from the direct taxpayers.
The Tea Duty, as the Committee will be aware, is a very old tax. I do not know that it derives any particular virtue from antiquity, but the fact is that ever since tea was introduced into this country some 300 years ago it has been a contributor to the revenue except during the halcyon period between the time that my right hon. Friend the Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill) took off the tax and the time when the stern necessities of 1932 forced the present Prime Minister to put it on again. During the whole period from 1914 to 1924 the tax on tea was at the rate of 8d. per pound or more. That is the rate which is now proposed, not for all tea but for foreign tea only. During the middle of that period, from 1915 to 1922, the tax upon tea was is. per pound, and up to 1919 no Empire preference was allowed. Let the Committee fully appreciate what this Empire preference means. I ventured to interrupt the hon. Gentleman who moved the Amendment last night to make the point, and perhaps the Committee will forgive me if I make it again. Ninety per cent. of the tea which is drunk in this country comes from Empire sources, and, therefore, when you have a duty of 8d. on foreign tea and 6d. on Empire tea, it does not mean, as one might suppose, an average incidence of the duty of 7d.; in point of fact the average duty is only about 61¼d.
I fully appreciate that what matters to the consumer is the effect of the duty upon the retail price of tea, which is where the shoe actually pinches. The hon. Gentleman the Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. White) made the point again last night, which was made during the discussion on the Budget Resolution, that any increase in the Tea Duty falls with disproportionate severity on the cheapest teas. That may be assumed to be a very reasonable proposition. I have been at some pains to discover the actual facts as a result of the imposition of this particular duty, which, as the Committee knows, has already been put on pending the consent of this House.

Mr. Graham White: I gave the facts last night.

Captain Wallace: The fact is that the average retail price paid for tea by the working classes, according to the Ministry

of Labour cost-of-living index, which was 2s. 2½d. before the Budget, had risen on the 1st June to 2s. 4¼d. In other words it has risen by rather less than the amount of the duty, and I am given to understand by the people who ought to know that there is no reason to suppose that any further rise will take place on account of the duty.

Mr. A. V. Alexander: That is 1¾d.

Captain Wallace: Yes, although the average duty has gone up by 2d. from 4¼d. to 6¼d.

Mr. Barnes: Has the right hon. and gallant Gentleman ascertained whether the blends remain the same?

Captain Wallace: I shall try to deal with that in a minute. I should like to mention a point which I think has not been brought forward, or certainly has not been emphasised during any speech in our discussions this year upon the Tea Duty; and that is that the vital factor in the price of tea, which is what matters to the consumer, and particularly to the small consumer, is not really the tax but the scheme for regulating exports of tea which the producers in India, Ceylon and the Dutch East Indies started hi 1933 with the support of their Governments. That scheme for regulating exports was originally arranged for five years and it has just been renewed, before it ran out, for another five. These particular countries supply more than 80 per cent. of the tea which enters into international trade, and the object of the scheme is admittedly to maintain the price of tea at a level which is profitable to the industry; I do not think that anybody from any quarter of the Committee would deny the desirability for ensuring to the producer of any primary commodity a price which will enable him to live. The Committee will see that this restriction scheme is a much more potent factor in determining the price of tea to the consumer than any action of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
I will give two illustrations of that very important fact. In the year 1928 the average rate of duty was 3½d. per lb. The average price paid for tea by the working classes at the beginning of June was 2s. 5d. per lb. At the present moment the effective rate of duty is 6¼d. instead of 3½d., and the


price of the working-class tea is 2s. 4¾d. instead of 2s. 5d. Take the year just before the restriction scheme began—the year 1932; the average auction price ex-duty of tea sold in London, excluding tea from China and Japan, was in that year 9.45d. per lb. In 1937, after four years of restriction, the average price ex-duty had risen from 9.45d. per lb. to 15.18d. per lb., and between 1933 and 1937 the average retail price of working-class tea rose from 4¾d. although the rate of duty rose by 2d. only.
There was one other question which was raised during the discussion on the Budget Resolution on the Tea Duty, on which I have made some particular inquiry. That was the case of tea which is sold in id., 2d., or 3d. packets. It was represented that an increase of duty such as is proposed in this Clause would bear with disproportionate harshness upon small quantities of that kind. From the information which is available to me—and I think I have correct information—there is no guaranteed weight in the case of id. and 2d. packets. In the case of the 3d. packets, some of them are labelled "2 ozs. net" and some are labeled "under 2 OZS." In any case where there is no specified weight, including the 3d. packets labelled "under 2 ozs.," it is obvious that any change in the duty can fairly be met by any trader who wishes to meet it fairly by altering either the quantity or the quality of the tea in the packet. In the more difficult case of the 3d. packet, when it is marked "2 ozs. net," I understand that, in general, the price of the packet has been put up by a farthing, which is exactly the correct amount. But there may be instances, and if there are no doubt hon. Members will know of them, where the price of the 3d. packets has gone up by a halfpenny. For example, there is one case known where the retailer will not go in for charging in facthings. He charges an extra halfpenny for the 2 oz. packet to casual customers, but to regular customers he alternates the charge of 3½d. with the pre-Budget price on successive purchases, thus averaging out an extra farthing per 2 ozs.

Mr. Gordon Macdonald: If he does not forget.

Mr. Muff: Where is this Simon Pure?

Captain Wallace: Even I do not know his name myself. There was another point in regard to the Tea Duty made last night by the hon. Gentleman the Member for East Birkenhead. He put what appeared to me to be a somewhat surprising view, that Imperial Preference is actually detrimental to Empire producers. He suggested that some of the Empire countries would be glad to see Imperial Preference done away with. But we have had no representations from the Indian Government that the preference is detrimental to this trade, and my right hon. Friend's advisers have no reason to think that the views which the hon. Member put forward are generally held amongst tea producers. I know that the hon. Member very seldom makes a remark of that kind or advances any contention without some knowledge which appears to him to be accurate, and we shall always be interested to hear anything more that he says on the subject.

Mr. White: I hoped that what I said would give the Chancellor of the Exchequer an opportunity of studying the information on which I made my statement, so that he could decide on its value or otherwise.

Mr. Woods: Has the Financial Secretary finished with the question as to the rise in the price of tea? Are we to understand that the rise in the price of tea is the reason for the additional rise brought about by the imposition of the tax? I did not follow the point of his argument.

Captain Wallace: If the hon. Member will be good enough to read my remarks in the OFFICIAL REPORT to-morrow, perhaps the point will be made clear to him. I thought that I made it tolerably clear to the rest of the Committee. To come back to the question of Imperial Preference, there is the important fact that a preference of 2d. per lb. was guaranteed to India under the Ottawa Agreement which is still in force, and the question of doing away with that preference does not arise for the moment as a practical proposition.
We have had a long Debate, which has been conducted with great sincerity and good temper, and I am not desirous of splitting hairs with hon. Members opposite about the precise average consumption of tea in this country, or the


actual addition to the family budget caused by the new duty. I am prepared to assume that the figures which were advanced on the 3rd May by the right hon. Member for Hillsborough (Mr. Alexander) that for a household of four persons the extra cost would be 22S. to 23s. a year, are somewhere near the mark. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman over-estimated the extra cost, but I should not be bold enough to say definitely that he did. I do not pretend that this extra tax on tea is not a burden, nor am I going to contend that it will not bear more hardly, as the junior Member for Oxford University (Sir A. Salter) pointed out last night, upon those whose material resources are the smallest. I am afraid that that is inevitably the case in the taxation of any commodity of practically universal consumption.
We have gone into some larger questions during this Debate. We have gone into the question of raising a larger percentage of revenue by direct as against indirect taxation. One or two hon. Members have advanced the contention, amounting almost to a recommendation to my right hon. Friend, that we should raise the whole of the 900-odd millions required this year, by the process of direct taxation. It may interest hon. Members to know that, if we have not reached what the hon. Member for West Fife (Mr. Gallacher) would regard as the millenium in this respect, we have at least in the last two or three years progressed some distance in the direction in which he would like to go. In the year 1936, 59.71 per cent. of tax revenue was raised by direct taxation; last year the figure went up to 60.78 and this year it has reached 63.03.
A number of alternatives have been suggested, but no one, except my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Armagh (Sir William Allen), who suggested that we might take off the extra tea tax altogether and chance it, has suggested that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer has not to find the money which is represented by the Estimates. Among the suggested alternatives have been taxes on bicycles and cosmetics. I think I am on safe ground in saying that every reasonable proposal for raising revenue, particularly by indirect taxation, is carefully canvassed and examined. I can assure hon.

Members that the feelings of my right hon. Friend and the rest of us on this Bench are not very different from the feelings of other hon. Members in other parts of the Committee. Some hon. Members talk as if the Government went out of their way deliberately to raise taxation by methods that are the least efficient and are calculated to attract the maximum amount of disagreement and unpopularity. I assure hon. Members that that is not the case, and, I believe that if and when the time comes that hon. Members opposite sit on this side, they will have as keen an appreciation of the difficulties as my right hon. Friend has now.
A sum of £2,750,000 has to be raised by this extra tax on tea. The tax can be justified, and I think it has been justified, and has been accepted by the country as justified, in relation to the general situation which the country has to face. It is not unfair to remind the Committee that the same people upon whom this additional 2d. on tea lays the heaviest burden will be the greatest beneficiaries from the increase in the social services this year, which is estimated to cost the Exchequer not £2,750,000 but £12,000,000 more than we spent last year.

5.53 P.m.

Mr. Alexander: Before we go to a Division upon this matter I hope the Committee will allow me to say, first, that the reply of the Financial Secretary, temperate and in accordance with his usual popular method of address, has entirely failed to meet the case which was put last night and again to-day. I regard it as rather ominous that he referred to this Debate on the Tea Duty as a hardy annual. That statement cannot be applied to this Debate, because we are debating now not a regular annual Motion for a special reduction—although we do include a reduced figure in our Amendment—but we are combating an increase in the duty. I hope it is not to be taken from what the Financial Secretary has said that while the country's expenditure increases we must of necessity have a hardy annual Debate upon a further measure of increase in the tax upon the consumer of tea.

Captain Wallace: I hope the right hon. Gentleman will not get that impression from what I said. I was dealing with


the question generally, because the Chairman ruled that although we were debating this particular Amendment we might also discuss the Tea Tax in general.

Mr. Alexander: I am glad to have that explanation. We must be expected to take note of the words used, unless we get the explanation. This is not the ordinary kind of annual Debate on the Tea Duty. Our main duty is to combat the imposition by which the Chancellor of the Exchequer proposes to raise a part of the extra money that is required by increasing the burden upon the consumers of tea. The Financial Secretary said that there has been no adequate or definite proposition made for enabling the Chancellor of the Exchequer to get the revenue he needs, by other methods. The Financial Secretary has not correctly interpreted the Debate in that respect. Two or three of my hon. Friends, including the Mover of the Amendment, and the hon. Member for Finsbury (Mr. Woods), pointed out that the Government are giving about £3,000,000 a year in added relief to industrial and profit-making concerns by the wear and tear proposals in regard to Income Tax. May I put the matter from the class of industry which I know best? Upon the movement which I represent in assessment for Income Tax and National Defence Contribution we shall get, on the concession that has been made, additional relief in respect of wear and tear. From that point of view it looks very well for us, but in practice we shall lose more than we gain, because of the tax which is put upon the consuming members of our organisation.
Looking at the question as a matter of justice for the whole country, I do not think that there can be any doubt that there was no real cause for increasing the wear and tear allowance if by so doing it was necessary to increase the impost upon the very poorest section of the community. The Chancellor of the Exchequer could have met the human case put by the hon. and gallant Member for Armagh (Sir W.

Allen) and the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Lipson) by simply cancelling the relief that he proposes to give under the wear and tear Schedule in relation to Income Tax. I feel as strongly as any of my hon. Friends in regard to the human plea, but I think our case can be justified also on the business plea.

We have had all kinds of figures given by the Financial Secretary about the condition of the tea trade. The hon. Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. White) was right when he drew attention to the fact that the more you increase duties of this kind upon a specific commodity the more danger you run of so injuring the industry connected with that commodity that you defeat, ultimately, your own objective. If we look at the consumption figures of tea in the last few years and take into account the fact that many of us who are interested in this trade have had to subscribe to great publicity campaigns to keep up the consumption of tea at present prices, I think it will be seen, looking at it as a great human question and also as a business proposition, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer cannot go on indefinitely using tea as a special revenue raiser, without killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. I hope that that side of the matter will not escape his attention.

When we come to a further Amendment on the Order Paper I hope that we shall be allowed to discuss in a wider sense the effect of the Chancellor of the Exchequer's policy in regard to the whole range of imposts affecting food taxation. If the hon. and gallant Member for Armagh and the hon. Member for Cheltenham are right in regard to the Tea Duty, they are right in regard to beef, sugar and all the common necessities. We shall resist at all stages proposals of this kind which, while many grow richer in the course of armament expenditure, further depress the standard of life of the poor.

Question put, "That the word 'increased,' stand part of the Clause."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 241; Noes, 144.

Division No. 246.]
AYES
[6.0 p.m.


Adams, S. V. T. (Leeds, W.)
Astor, Hon. W. W. (Fulham, E.)
Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P. H.


Agnew, Lieut.-Comdr. P. G.
Athell, Duchess of
Beauchamp, Sir B. C.


Albery, Sir Irving
Balfour, Capt. H. H. (Isle of Thanet)
Beaumont, Hon. R. E. B. (Portsm'h)


Amery, Rt. Hon. L. C. M. S.
Balniel, Lord
Beechman, N. A.


Anstruther-Gray, W. J.
Barclay-Harvey, Sir C. M.
Belt, Sir A. L.


Assheton, R.
Baxter, A. Beverley
Bennett, Sir E. N.




Bernays, R. H.
Gower, Sir R. V.
Rawson, Sir Cooper


Blair, Sir R.
Graham, Captain A. C. (Wirral)
Rayner, Major R. H.


Boulton, W. W.
Gridley, Sir A. B.
Reed, A. C. (Exeter)


Boyce, H. Leslie
Grigg, Sir E. W. M.
Reed, Sir H. S. (Aylesbury)


Bracken, B.
Grimston, R. V.
Reid, Sir D. D. (Down)


Brass, Sir W.
Gunston, Capt. Sir D. W.
Reid, W. Allan (Derby)


Briscoe, Capt. R. G.
Hambro, A. V.
Remer, J. R.


Broadbridge, Sir G. T.
Hannon, Sir P. J. H.
Rickards, G. W. (Skipton)


Brown, Col. D. C. (Hexham)
Haslam, Sir J. (Bolton)
Robinson, J. R. (Blackpool)


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Newbury)
Heilgers, Captain F. F. A.
Ropner, Colonel L.


Browne, A. C. (Belfast, W.)
Hely-Hutchinson, M. R.
Ross Taylor, W. (Woodbridge)


Bull, B. B.
Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel A. P.
Rowlands, G.


Bullock, Capt. M.
Herbert, Capt. Sir S. (Abbey)
Royds, Admiral Sir P. M. R.


Burton, Cal. H. W.
Higgs, W. F.
Russell, Sir Alexander


Butcher, H. W.
Holmes, J. S.
Russell, S. H. M. (Darwen)


Cartland, J. R. H.
Hope, Captain Han. A. O. J.
Salt, E. W.


Carver, Major W. H.
Hopkinson, A.
Samuel, M. R. A.


Cary, R. A.
Horsbrugh, Florence
Sandeman, Sir N. S.


Cayzer, Sir C. W. (City of Chester)
Howitt, Dr. A. B.
Sanderson, Sir F. B.


Cayzer, Sir H. R. (Portsmouth, S.)
Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hack., N.)
Sandys, E. D.


Cazalet, Thelma (Islington, E.)
Hulbert, N. J.
Shakespeare, G. H.


Cazalet, Capt. V. A. (Chippenham)
Hunloke, H. P.
Shaw, Captain W. T. (Forfar)


Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. N. (Edgb't'n)
Hunter, T.
Shepperson, Sir E. W.


Channon, H.
Jarvis, Sir J. J.
Shute, Colonel Sir J. J.


Chapman, Sir S. (Edinburgh, S.)
Joel, D. J. B.
Simmonds, O. E.


Charlton, A. E. L.
Jones, Sir G. W. H. (S'k N'w'gt'n)
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir J. A.


Clarke, Frank (Dartford)
Keeling, E. H.
Smiles, Lieut.-Colonel Sir W. D.


Clarke, Colonel R. S. (E. Grinstead)
Kerr, Colonel C. I. (Montrose)
Smith, Bracewell (Dulwich)


Clarry, Sir Reginald
Kerr, H. W. (Oldham)
Smith, Sir R. W. (Aberdeen)


Cobb, Captain E. C. (Preston)
Latham, Sir P.
Smithers, Sir W.


Colfax, Major W. P.
Leech, Sir J. W.
Somervell, Rt. Hon. Sir Donald


Colville, Rt. Hon. John
Leighton, Major B. E. P.
Southby, Commander Sir A. R. J.


Conant, Captain R. J. E.
Lewis, O.
Spears, Brigadier-General E. L.


Cook, Sir T. R. A. M. (Norfolk, N.)
Llewellin, Colonel J. J.
Spens, W. P.


Cooke, J. D. (Hammersmith, S.)
Loftus, P. C.
Stanley, Rt. Hon. Lord (Fyide)


Cooper, Rt. Hn. A. Duff (W'st'r S. G'gs)
Mabane, W. (Huddersfield)
Stanley, Rt. Hon. Oliver (W'm'l'd)


Cooper, Rt. Hn. T. M. (E'nburgh, W.)
MacAndrew, Colonel Sir C. G.
Stewart, J. Henderson (Fife, E.)


Courthope, Col. Rt. Hon. Sir G. L.
M'Conneil, Sir J.
Stourton, Major Hon. J. J.


Cox, H. B. Trevor
McCorquodale, M. S.
Strauss, E. A. (Southwark, N.)


Crooke, Sir J. S.
McEwen, Capt. J. H. F.
Strauss, H. G. (Norwich)


Cross, R. H.
Maclay, Hon. J. P.
Stuart, Lord C. Crichton- (N'thw'h)


Crossley, A. C.
Maonamara, Major J. R. J.
Stuart, Hon. J. (Moray and Nairn)


Crowder, J. F. E.
Makins, Brigadier-General Sir Ernest
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Sir M. F.


Cruddas, Col. B.
Manningham-Buller, Sir M.
Tate, Mavis C.


Culverwell, C. T.
Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.
Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)


Davies, Major Sir G. F. (Yeovil)
Markham, S. F.
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (Padd., S.)


De la Bère, R.
Mason, Lt.-Col. Hon. G. K. M.
Thomson, Sir J. D. W.


Denman, Hon. R. D.
Maxwell, Hon. S. A.
Titchfield, Marquess of


Denville, Alfred
Mayhew, Lt.-Col. J.
Touche, G. C.


Despencer-Robertson, Major J. A. F.
Meller, Sir R. J. (Mitcham)
Tufnell, Lieut.-Commander R. L.


Doland, G. F.
Mellor, Sir J. S. P. (Tamworth)
Wakefield, W. W.


Donner, P. W.
Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)
Walker-Smith, Sir J.


Dorman-Smith, Major Sir R. H.
Moore, Lieut.-Col. Sir T. C. R.
Wallace, Capt. Rt. Hon. Euan


Dugdale, Captain T. L.
Moreing, A. C.
Ward, Lieut.-Cot. Sir A. L. (Hull)


Duggan, H. J.
Morgan, R. H.
Ward, Irene M. B. (Wallsend)


Dunglass, Lord
Muirhead, Lt.-Col. A. J.
Wardlaw-Milne, Sir J. S.


Eastwood, J. F.
Munro, P.
Warrender, Sir V.


Eden, Rt. Hon. A.
Nicholson, G. (Farnham)
Waterhouse, Captain C.


Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.
O'Connor, Sir Terence J.
Watt, Major G. S. Harvie


Ellis, Sir G.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir Hugh
Wayland, Sir W. A.


Elliston, Capt. G. S.
Palmer, G. E. H.
Wedderburn, H. J. S.


Elmley, Viscount
Patrick, C. M.
Wells, Sir Sydney


Emery, J. F.
Peaks, O.
Whiteley, Major J. P. (Buckingham)


Entwistle, Sir C. F.
Perkins, W. R. D.
Williams, H. G. (Croydon, S.)


Errington, E.
Peters, Dr. S. J.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel G.


Findlay, Sir E.
Petherick, M.
Wise, A. R.


Fleming, E. L.
Pickthorn, K. W. M.
Withers, Sir J. J.


Fox, Sir G. W. G.
Pensonby, Col. C. E.
Womersley, Sir W. J.


Fremantle, Sir F. E.
Porritt, R. W.
Wood, Hon. C. I. C.


Furness, S. N.
Power, Sir J. C.
Wright, Wing-Commander J. A. C.


Fyfe, D. P. M.
Procter, Major H. A.
Young, A. S. L. (Partick)


Gibson, Sir C. G. (Pudsey and Otley)
Purbrick, R.



Gledhill, G.
Radford, E. A.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Gluckstein, L. H.
Raikes, H. V. A. M.
Major Sir James Edmondson and


Glyn, Major Sir R. G. C.
Ramsay, Captain A. H. M.
Major Herbert.


Goldie, N. B.
Rathhone, J. R. (Bodmin)





NOES.


Adams, D. (Consett)
Banfield, J. W.
Benson, G.


Adams, D. M. (Poplar, S.)
Barnes, A. J.
Bevan, A.


Adamson, W. M.
Barr, J.
Buchanan, G.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V. (H'lsbr.)
Batey, J.
Burke, W. A.


Allen, Lt.-Col. Sir W. J. (Armagh)
Bellenger, F. J.
Cape, T.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Benn, Rt. Hon. W. W.
Casseils, T.







Cluse, W. S.
John, W.
Roberts, Rt. Hon. F. O. (W. Brom.)


Cocks, F. S.
Jones, A. C. (Shipley)
Roberts, W. (Cumberland, N.)


Cove, W. G.
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Robinson, W. A. (St. Helens)


Dagger, G.
Kelly, W. T.
Rothschild, J. A. de


Dalton, H.
Kennedy, Rt. Hon. T.
Salter, Dr. A. (Bermondsey)


Davidson, J. J. (Maryhill)
Kirby, B. V.
Salter, Sir J. Arthur (Oxford U.)


Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Lansbury, Rt. Hon. G.
Seely, Sir H. M.


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Lathan, G.
Sexton, T. M.


Day, H.
Lawson, J. J.
Shinwell, E.


Dobbie, W.
Leach, W.
Silkin, L.


Dunn, E. (Rother Valley)
Lee, F.
Silverman, S. S.


Ede, J. C.
Leonard, W.
Simpson, F. B.


Edwards, A. (Middlesbrough E.)
Leslie, J. R.
Sinclair, Rt. Hon. Sir A. (C'thn's)


Edwards, Sir C. (Bedwellty)
Lipson, D. L.
Smith, Ben (Rotherhithe)


Fletcher, Lt.-Comdr. R. T. H.
Logan, D. G.
Smith, E. (Stoke)


Foot, D. M.
Lunn, W.
Smith, T. (Normanton)


Gallacher, W.
Macdonald, G. (Ince)
Sorensen, R. W.


Gardner, B. W.
McEntee, V. La T.
Stephen, C.


Garro Jones, G. M.
McGhee, H. G.
Stewart, W. J. (H'ght'n-le-Sp'ng)


George, Rt. Hon. D. Lloyd (Carn'v'n)
MacLaren, A.
Stokes, R. R.


George, Major G. Lloyd (Pembroke)
Macmillan, H. (Stockton-on-Tees)
Strauss, G. R. (Lambeth, N.)


George, Megan Lloyd (Anglesey)
MacMillan, M. (Western Isles)
Summerskill, Dr. Edith


Gibson, R. (Greenock)
Mander, G. le M.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)


Green, W. H. (Deptford)
Mathers, G.
Thurtle, E.


Grenfell, D. R.
Maxton, J.
Tinker, J. J.


Griffith, F. Kingsley (M'ddl'sbro, W.)
Messer, F.
Tomlinson, G.


Griffiths, J. (Llanelly)
Milner, Major J.
Viant, S. P.


Groves, T. E.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Hackney, S.)
Walkden, A. G.


Guest, Dr. L. H. (Islington, N.)
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, N.)
Walker, J.


Hall, G. H. (Aberdare)
Muff, G.
Watkins, F. C.


Hall, J. H. (Whitechapel)
Naylor, T. E.
Watson, W. McL.


Hardie, Agnes
Oliver, G. H.
Wedgwood, Rt. Hon. J. C.


Harris, Sir P. A.
Owen, Major G.
Westwood, J.


Harvey, T. E. (Eng. Univ's.)
Paling, W.
White, H. Graham


Hayday, A.
Parker, J.
Wilkinson, Ellen


Henderson, A. (Kingswinford)
Parkinson, J. A.
Williams, D. (Swansea, E.)


Henderson, J. (Ardwick)
Pearson, A.
Williams, E. J (Ogmore)


Henderson, T. (Tradeston)
Pethick-Lawrence, Rt. Hon. F. W.
Williams, T. (Don Valley)


Hicks, E. G.
Price, M. P.
Wilson, C. H. (Attercliffe)


Hills, A. (Pontefract)
Richards, R. (Wrexham)
Woods, G. S. (Finsbury)


Hollins, A.
Ridley, G.



Hopkin, D.
Riley, B.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Jenkins, A. (Pontypool)
Ritson, J.
Mr. Whiteley and Mr. Anderson.

Question put, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

Division No. 247.]
AYES.
[6.10 p.m.


Adams, S. V. T. (Leeds, W.)
Cary, R. A.
Donner, P. W.


Agnew, Lieut.-Comdr. P. G.
Cayzer, Sir C. W. (City of Chester)
Dorman-Smith, Major Sir R. H.


Albery, Sir Irving
Cayzer, Sir H. R. (Portsmouth, S.)
Dugdale, Captain T. L.


Amery, Rt. Hon. L. C. M. S.
Cazalet, Thelma (Islington, E.)
Duggan, H. J.


Anstruther-Gray, W. J.
Cazaiet, Capt. V. A. (Chippenham)
Dunglass, Lord


Assheton, R.
Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. N. (Edgb't'n)
Eastwood, J. F.


Astor, Hon. W. W. (Fulham, E.)
Channon, H.
Eden, Rt. Hon. A.


Atholl, Duchess of
Chapman, Sir S. (Edinburgh, S.)
Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.


Balfour, Capt. H. H. (Isle of Thanet)
Cheriton, A. E. L.
Ellis, Sir G.


Balniel, Lord
Clarke, Frank (Dartford)
Elliston, Capt. G. S.


Barclay-Harvey, Sir C. M.
Clarke, Colonel R. S. (E. Grinstead)
Elmiey, Viscount


Baxter, A. Beverley
Clarry, Sir Reginald
Emery, J. F.


Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P. H.
Cobb, Captain E. C. (Preston)
Entwistle, Sir C. F.


Beauchamp, Sir B. C.
Colfax, Major W. P.
Errington, E.


Beaumont, Hon. R. E. B. (Portsm'h)
Colville, Rt. Hon. John
Evans, Capt. A. (Cardiff, S.)


Beechman, N. A.
Conant, Captain R. J. E.
Findlay, Sir E.


Belt, Sir A. L.
Cook, Sir T. R. A. M. (Norfolk, N.)
Fleming, E. L.


Bennett, Sir E. N.
Cooke, J. D. (Hammersmith, S.)
Fox, Sir G. W. G.


Bernays, R. H.
Cooper, Rt. He, A. Duff (W'st'r S. G'gs)
Fremantle, Sir F. E.


Blair, Sir R.
Cooper, Rt. Hn. T. M. (E'nburgh, W.)
Furness, S. N.


Boulton, W. W.
Courthope, Col. Rt. Hon. Sir G. L.
Fyfe, D. P. M.


Boyce, H. Leslie
Cox, H. B. Trevor
Gibson, Sir C. G. (Pudsey and Otley)


Bracken, B.
Crooke, Sir J. S.
Gledhill, G.


Brass, Sir W.
Cross, R. H.
Gluckstein, L. H.


Briscoe, Capt. R. G.
Crossley, A. C.
Glyn, Major Sir R. G. C.


Brown, Col. D. C. (Hexham)
Crowder, J. F. E.
Goldie, N. B.


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Newbury)
Cruddas, Col. B.
Gower, Sir R. V.


Browne, A. C. (Belfast, W.)
Culverwell, C. T.
Graham, Captain A. C. (Wirral)


Bull, B. B.
Davies, C. (Montgomery)
Gridley, Sir A. B.


Bullock, Capt. M.
Davies, Major Sir G. F. (Yeovil)
Grigg, Sir E. W. M.


Burton, Col. H. W.
Denman, Hon. R. D.
Grimston, R. V.


Butcher, H. W.
Denville, Alfred
Gunston, Capt. Sir D. W.


Cartland, J. R H.
Despencer-Robertson, Major J A. F.
Hambre, A. V.


Carver, Major W. H.
Doland, G. F.
Hannon, Sir P. J. H.

The Committee divided: Ates, 237; Noes, 142.

Harvey, Sir G.
Morgan, R. H.
Smiles, Lieut.-Colonel Sir W. D.


Haslam, Sir J. (Belton)
Muirhead, Lt.-Col. A. J.
Smith, Bracewell (Dulwich)


Heilgers, Captain F. F. A.
Munro, P.
Smith, Sir R. W. (Aberdeen)


Hely-Hutchinson, M. R.
Nicholson, G. (Farnham)
Smithers, Sir W.


Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel A. P.
O'Connor, Sir Terence J.
Somerveil, Rt. Hon. Sir Donald


Herbert, Capt. Sir S. (Abbey)
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir Hugh
Southby, Commander Sir A. R. J.


Higgs, W. F.
Patrick, C. M.
Spears, Brigadier-General E. L.


Holmes, J. S.
Puke, O.
Spens, W. P.


Hope, Captain Hon. A. O. J.
Perkins, W. R. D.
Stanley, Rt. Hon. Lord (Fylde)


Hopkinson, A.
Peters, Dr. S. J.
Stanley, Rt. Hon. Oliver (W'm'ld)


Horsbrugh, Florence
Petherick, M.
Stewart, J. Henderson (Fife, E.)


Howitt, Dr. A. B.
Pickthorn, K. W. M.
Strauss, E. A. (Southwark, N.)


Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hack., N.)
Ponsonby, Col. C. E.
Strauss, H. G. (Norwich)


Hulbert, N. J.
Perritt, R. W.
Stuart, Lord C. Crichton-(N'thw'h)


Hunloke, H. P.
Power, Sir J. C.
Stuart, Hon. J. (Moray and Nairn)


Hunter, T.
Procter, Major H. A.
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Sir M. F.


Jarvis, Sir J. J.
Radford, E. A.
Tate, Mavis C.


Joel, D. J. B.
Raikes, H. V. A. M.
Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)


Keeling, E. H.
Ramsay, Captain A. H. M.
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (Padd., S.)


Kerr, Colonel C. I. (Montrose)
Rathbone, J. R. (Bodmin)
Thomson, Sir J. D. W.


Kerr, H. W. (Oldham)
Rawson, Sir Cooper
Titchfield, Marquess of


Latham, Sir P.
Rayner, Major R. H.
Touche, G. C.


Leech, Sir J. W.
Reed, A. C. (Exeter)
Wakefield, W. W.


Leighton, Major B. E. P.
Reed, Sir H. S. (Aylesbury)
Walker-Smith, Sir J.


Lewis, O.
Reid, Sir D. D. (Down)
Wallace, Capt. Rt. Hon. Euan


Llewellin, Colonel J. J.
Reid, W. Allan (Derby)
Ward, Lieut.-Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)


Mabane, W. (Huddersfield)
Remer, J. R.
Ward, Irene M. B. (Wallsend)


MacAndrew, Colonel Sir C. G.
Rickards, G. W. (Skipton)
Wardlaw-Milne, Sir J. S.


M'Connell, Sir J.
Robinson, J. R. (Blackpool)
Warrender, Sir V.


McCorquodale, M. S.
Ropner, Colonel L.
Waterhouse, Captain C.


McEwen, Capt. J. H. F.
Ross Taylor, W. (Woodbridge)
Watt, Major G. S. Harvie


Maclay, Hon. J. P.
Rowlands, G.
Wayland, Sir W. A


Macnamara, Major J. R. J.
Royds, Admiral Sir P. M. R.
Wedderburn, H. J. S.


Maitland, A.
Russell, Sir Alexander
Wells, Sir Sydney


Makins, Brigadier-General Sir Ernest
Russell, S. H. M. (Darwen)
Whiteley, Major J. P. (Buckingham)


Manningham-Buller, Sir M.
Salt, E. W.
Williams, H. G. (Croydon, S.)


Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.
Samuel, M. R. A.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel G.


Markham, S. F.
Sandeman, Sir N. S.
Wise, A. R.


Mason, Lt.-Col. Hon. G. K. M.
Sanderson, Sir F. B.
Withers, Sir J. J.


Maxwell, Hon. S. A.
Sandys, E. D.
Womersley, Sir W. J.


Mayhew, Lt.-Col. J.
Shakespeare, G. H.
Wood, Hon. C. I. C.


Mellor, Sir R. J. (Mitcham)
Shaw, Captain W. T. (Forfar)
Wright, Wing-Commander J. A. C.


Mellor, Sir J. S. P. (Temworth)
Shepperson, Sir E. W.
Young, A. S. L. (Patrick)


Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)
Shute, Colonel Sir J. J.



Moore, Lieut.-Col. Sir T. C. R.
Simmonds, O. E.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES—


Moreing, A. C.
Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir J. A.
Major Sir James Edmondson




Major Herbert.




NOES.


Adams, D. (Consett)
Gerro Jones, G. M.
Lee, F.


Adams, D. M. (Poplar, S.)
George, Major G. Lloyd (Pembroke)
Leonard, W.


Alexander, Rt. Hon. A. V. (H'lsbr.)
George, Megan Lloyd (Anglesey)
Leslie, J. R.


Anderson, F. (Whitehaven)
Gibson, R. (Greenock)
Lipson, D. L.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Green, W. H. (Deptford)
Logan, D. G.


Banfield, J. W.
Grenfell, D. R.
Lunn, W.


Barnes, A. J.
Griffith, F. Kingsley (M'ddl sbro, W.)
Macdonald, G. (Ince)


Barr, J.
Griffiths, J. (Llanelly)
McEntee, V. La T.


Betsy, J.
Groves, T. E.
McGhee, H. G.


Bellenger F. J.
Guest, Dr. L. H. (Islington, N.)
MacLaren, A.


Benn, Rt. Hon. W. W.
Hall, G. H. (Aberdare)
Macmillan, H. (Stockton-on-Tees)


Benson, G.
Hall, J. H. (Whitechapel)
MacMillan, M. (Western Isles)


Bevan, A.
Hardie, Agnes
Mender, G. le M.


Buchanan, G.
Harris, Sir P. A.
Mathers, G.


Burke, W. A.
Harvey, T. E. (Eng. Univ's.)
Maxton, J.


Cape, T.
Heyday, A.
Messer, F.


Cassells, T.
Henderson, A. (Kingswinford)
Milner, Major J.


Cocks, F. S.
Henderson, J. (Ardwick)
Morrison, Rt. Hon. H. (Hackney, S.)


Cove, W. G.
Henderson, T. (Tradeston)
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham, N.)


Daggar, G.
Hicks, E. G.
Muff, G.


Dalton, H.
Hills, A. (Pontefract)
Naylor, T. E.


Davidson, J. J. (Maryhill)
Hollins, A.
Noel-Baker, P. J.


Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Hopkin, D.
Oliver, G. H.


Davies, S. O. (Merthyr)
Jenkins, A. (Pontypool)
Owen, Major G.


Day, H.
John, W.
Paling, W.


Debbie, W.
Jones, A. C. (Shipley)
Parker, J.


Dunn, E. (Rother Valley)
Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Parkinson, J. A.


Ede, J. C.
Kelly, W. T.
Pearson, A.


Edwards, A. (Middlesbrough E.)
Kennedy, Rt. Hon. T.
Pethick-Lawrence, Rt. Hon. F. W.


Edwards, Sir C. (Bedwellty)
Kirby, B. V.
Price, M. P.


Fletcher, Lt.-Comdr. R. T. H.
Lansbury, Rt. Hon. G.
Richards, R. (Wrexham)


Foot, D. M.
Lathan, G.
Ridley, G.


Gallagher, W.
Lawson, J. J.
Riley, B.


Gardner, B. W.
Leach, W.
Rilson, J.







Roberts, Rt. Hen. F. O. (W. Brom.)
Smith, E. (Stoke)
Walker, J.


Roberts, W. (Cumberland, N.)
Smith, T. (Normanton)
Watkins, F. C.


Robinson, W. A. (St. Helens)
Sorensen, R. W.
Watson, W. McL.


Rothsehild, J. A. de
Stephen, C.
Wedgwood, Rt. Hon. J. C.


Salter, Dr. A. (Bermondsey)
Stewart, W. J. (H'ghtn-le-Sp'ng)
Westwood, J.


Salter, Sir J. Arthur (Oxford U.)
Stokes, R. R.
White, H. Graham


Seely, Sir H. M.
Strauss, G. R. (Lambeth, N.)
Wilkinson, Ellen


Sexton, T. M.
Summerskill, Dr. Edith
Williams, D. (Swansea, E.)


Shinwell, E.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)
Williams, E. J. (Ogmore)


Silkin, L.
Thurtle, E.
Williams, T. (Don Valley)


Silverman, S. S.
Tinker, J. J.
Wilson, C. H. (Attercliffe)


Simpson, F. B.
Tomlinson, G.
Woods, G. S. (Finsbury)


Sinclair, Rt. Hon. Sir A. (C'thn's)
Viant, S. P.



Smith, Ben (Rotherhithe)
Walkden, A. G.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—




Mr. Whiteley and Mr. Adamson

Clauses 6 to 17 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

CLAUSE 18.—(Amendments of Schedule C and consequential Amendments of Schedule D.)

6.22 p.m.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I beg to move, in page 12, line 40, to leave out Subsection (8).
This Clause, and Clauses 19 and 20, cover certain important matters of principle, as well as some technical details. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Spens) and I are challenging the principle that when a change is made in the Income Tax laws covering ground which is in dispute between a taxpayer and the Government, that change must not be made retro-active unless Parliament fully understands the circumstances and knows exactly what is being done. May I say that we appreciate to the full the difficulties with which the Revenue is faced in this situation, but it is important to realise that these Clauses cover cases which were in dispute between taxpayers and the Inland Revenue Department over a considerable period of time, in fact ever since the spate of defaults started on foreign bonds following the depression of 1931–32. The necessity for these Clauses, as I understand, arises out of two suits which were decided against the Government during 1937. The first of these is what is known as the London Provincial suit, and the second the Dorothy Paget suit. The first of these suits was fostered from the very beginning by the Association of Investment Trusts, and I may mention that that association is a body representing, as its name implies, investment trusts, having an invested capital of some £400,000,000, representing the investments of at least 250,000 investors small and large. The Dorothy Paget case, which came on later, was also fostered by that body. The

history of the cases is this: The London Provincial case, which covered the taxability of the proceeds of funding bonds issued by the Brazilian Government in New York in lieu of the coupons of certain Brazilian dollar bonds, was decided by the special—

Whereupon the GENTLEMAN USHER OF THE BLACK ROD being come with a Message, The CHAIRMAN left the Chair.

Mr. SPEAKER resumed the Chair.

ROYAL ASSENT.

Message to attend the Lords Commissioners.

The House went; and, having returned—

Mr. SPEAKER reported the Royal Assent to—

1. Prevention and Treatment of Blindness (Scotland) Act, 1938.
2. Air Navigation (Financial Provisions) Act, 1938.
3. Leasehold Property (Repairs) Act, 1938.
4. Housing (Rural Workers) Amendment Act, 1938.
5. Infanticide Act, 1938.
6. Crewe Corporation Act, 1938.
7. Radcliffe Farnworth and District Gas Act, 1938.
8. Romford Gas Act, 1938.
9. Lee Conservancy Act, 1938.
10. Irwell Valley Water Board Act, 1938.
11. London County Council (Money) Act, 1938.
12. Ossett Corporation Act, 1038.
13. Rickmansworth and Uxbridge Valley Water Act, 1938.
14. London County Council (General Powers) Act, 1938.
15. Manchester Corporation Act, 1938.
16. Wakefield Corporation Act, 1938.
17. Plymouth Corporation Act, 1938.
18. Gateshead Corporation Act, 1938.

And to the following Measures passed under the provisions of the Church of England Assembly (Powers) Act, 1919:—

1. Parsonages Measure, 1938.

2. Ecclesiastical Commissioners (Powers) Measure, 1938.

FINANCE BILL.

Again considered in Committee.

[Captain BOURNE in the Chair.]

Question again proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out, to the word 'and,' in page 13, line 12, stand part of the Clause."

6.37 p.m.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I was saying that the first of these suits, the London Provincial suit, was decided in July, 1935, against the Government, by the Special Commissioners of Income Tax and it may be convenient if I briefly describe the subject-matter of the suit. The London Provincial Trust was the owner of certain Brazilian bonds. When the coupons on those bonds fell due, the Brazilian Government found it impossible to meet them. It therefore issued, in lieu of those coupons, funding bonds equal in face amount to the face value of those coupons. For instance, let us suppose that the face amount of a coupon was £3,the Brazilian Government gave the holder of that coupon, instead of £3 in cash, a promise to pay £3 at some future date 20 years ahead, and to pay interest on the amount of that promise in the meanwhile.
The suit which was decided against the Government by the Commissioners was later decided against the Government in the Court of King's Bench and in the Court of Appeal, but I would like at this stage to point out that the decision in the Court of Appeal went a great deal further than even the litigants themselves expected—and this also applies with greater emphasis to the Paget case—so that if the decision held, the result would have been apparently that in certain cases where bonds had not gone into default and the coupon was being paid in full and in cash, then, if that coupon was collected in a particular way and cashed outside the United Kingdom, the Government would find themselves unable to collect tax thereon.
That is undisputed ground and the general body of taxpayers would not wish

such a situation to arise. It is for that reason that we do not advance our objections to the retro-active principle solely on doctrinal grounds. If it is necessary for the purpose of protecting the revenue in respect of cases which have not been in dispute; if it is necessary to protect the revenue against claims for taxes illegally collected, where the subject-matter of the tax has never been in dispute—if it is necessary for that purpose to apply the retro-active principle, then, little though we like that principle, we feel that it must be suffered. But we are not prepared to suffer its application to cases which have been in dispute between the general body of taxpayers and the Government for some considerable time past, and in respect of which when these cases were carried to court, decisions were given against the Government.
The other case, the Dorothy Paget case, was decided by the Special Commissioners of Income Tax in February, 1936. There were two items in that suit. One was on Yugoslavian bonds, in which the decision was against the Government and the other on Hungarian bonds, in which the decision was for the Government. Both the London Provincial case and the Dorothy Paget case were carried to the Court of King's Bench, and there, a decision was given against the Government in July, 1937. When this decision was given against the Government a number of paying agents who, up to that time, has been deducting from the proceeds of such coupons the relevant amount of tax and paying it over to the Government, under instructions from the Inland Revenue Department—although some of those paying agents disputed in their minds at any rate, the legality of such a proceeding—came to the Government and said, "In view of this decision what are we to do in the future? "The Inland Revenue Department replied on 19th August, 1937, in a memorandum issued from Somerset House. The substance of their reply was an instruction to the paying agents, that the consent of the taxpayer concerned should be obtained before tax was deducted and that he should be informed (1) that the relevant decision of the High Court was under appeal, (2) that any tax deducted in accordance with this arrangement would be refunded by the Revenue if it should ultimately be found not to be legally payable—that phrase is important—and (3) that if the tax was


not deducted and was ultimately found to be legally payable, the taxpayer would be called upon to pay the tax under a direct assessment made upon him.
I refer to that document because it has a special application to one of the provisos to Sub-section (8) which we are now challenging. Proviso (b.) of Sub-section (8) specifically exempts from the operations of the retro-active principle all cases which arose between 29th July, 1937, the date upon which the suit was decided and 27th April, 1938, the date of the Money Resolution following the Budget. The insertion of paragraph (b) is an admission of the justice of the claims of those particular taxpayers, but it is an admission only for a certain period, namely, after the suit has been decided against the Government, and up to the date of this Bill.
Now let us carry this a little further. Both cases were appealed by the Government to the Court of Appeal and were decided by a sweeping decision of the Court of Appeal in January, 1938. I think I am right in saying—the Attorney-General will correct me if I am wrong—that all three judges of the Court of Appeal decided against the Government. The Government gave notice of their decision to appeal to the House of Lords. On 17th March, 1938, the Secretary of the Association of Investment Trusts wrote to the Secretary of the Inland Revenue, because it was getting near to the end of the fiscal year, and it was necessary, in the view of members of the association, to protect themselves for six years back in respect of any claims they might have to make arising out of the cases decided against the Government. It has been the practice for many years, when test cases of this kind are brought, that only the test case itself shall be brought and that all dependent cases shall be deferred until a later time, but in view of the fact that the end of the fiscal year was approaching, it appeared to be necessary to get all these other cases on record, otherwise they might be excluded from claiming back in respect of the first of the six years, namely, 1932. The letter of the Secretary of the Association of Investment Trusts refers to an interview which took place between himself and the Secretary of the Inland Revenue and states:
 In regard to the recovery of sums handed over to the Commissioners of Inland Revenue either (a) by deduction from the

proceeds of the sale of coupons in default, or, secondly, (b) by deduction from funding bonds or other securities issued in purported satisfaction of the interest payable under bonds and other securities, or (c) by direct assessment of the bondholders who have received funding bonds for other securities as above.
The letter goes on to say that
it was intimated at that interview that consideration was being given to the question of commencing proceedings on or before 5th April for the recovery of sums so paid over to the Commissioners and in order to avoid a multiplicity of such proceedings an assurance was asked that if particulars of claims of members of the Association were lodged by me (the Secretary of the Association) with the Commissioner before that date"—

The Deputy-Chairman: This is a very complicated matter. I have been listening with great attention to the hon. Member, and it appears to me that he is dealing both with this Amendment and the subsequent Amendment in the same speech. I do not know whether he wishes to pursue that course, but, if so, I am agreeable.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: If that is agreeable to you, Captain Bourne, the whole matter could be discussed at one time. I think it would be much simpler, though it was not my intention to exceed the limits of order.

Mr. Bellenger: On a point of Order. Are we discussing the next Amendment also?

The Deputy-Chairman: Yes. I was listening very carefully to the hon. Member, and obviously it is very difficult to deal with this case without covering both cases. The point which he was just making was really the point of the second Amendment, and I think it will be for the convenience of the Committee to discuss them both together, reserving the right of the hon. Member to take a Division on the second Amendment if he so desires.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I am much obliged to you, Captain Bourne. The letter goes on:
then the Commissioners would agree that members so lodging particulars of their claims would be treated as being in exactly the same position as if they had individually commenced proceedings either by way of appeal or petition of right on or before 5th April, 1938.

Mr. Benson: Does that mean appeals going back for six years?

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I will try to explain that as far as I am able, but I dare say the Attorney-General will make it clear later on. The reply of the Secretary of the Inland Revenue was substantially as follows:
In reply, I am directed by the Board to give you their assurance that if you, on behalf of members of the Association, lodge particulars of their claim on or before 5th April next, the Board will treat the claims as being in exactly the same position as if those members had individually commenced proceedings whether by way of appeal or petition of right on or before that date.
If I may refer to proviso (a) of Sub-section (8), it will be seen that proviso (a, i) exempts from the effect of this Sub-section the actual litigants, and I think I am right in saying that proviso (a, ii) does the same, merely amplifying that. Proviso (a, iii) exempts from the application of this Sub-section only those who have given notice of appeal against an assessment. There are two ways, as I understand it, of collecting tax. One is by deduction at the source, and the other is by making an assessment. If a tax is wrongfully imposed, and if it has been collected by deduction at source, the taxpayer's method of procedure to get it back is by petition of right, but if, on the other hand, it is imposed by an assessment, then his only way is to protest against the assessment within 21 days of receiving the assessment, or else he is out of court for all time. The effect of proviso (a, iii) is to allow those who appealed against an assessment, exemption from the retroactive provisions of this Sub-section, but, if I may say so, it is not a very generous allowance, because unless they appealed within 21 days of receiving the assessment, they are ruled out of court. Consequently, the danger to which the revenue is subjected by proviso (a, iii) is not very great. But no proviso is given for exempting from the operation of this Sub-section the very much larger body of taxpayers who have. during this long period, according to the decision of the court, suffered illegal deduction of tax at the source.
We wish to establish, in the first place, that defaulted bonds fall into an entirely different category from non-defaulted bonds. There is an enormous number of different ways in which, on default of a bond, the defaulting debtor seeks to

satisfy his creditor. One of the best known cases is that which is covered largely by Clause 20, to which it may be appropriate to make some reference later, where a funding bond is issued whose face value is equal to the face value of the defaulted coupons; but there are heaps of other ways whereby defaulting debtors have sought to satisfy their creditors; sometimes by paying in part cash and paying nothing on the balance—that is the case with regard to the Grecian bonds—sometimes, as in the case of the Budapest bonds, by paying in blocked currency, in the currency of some foreign country which is only available for payment in that country; and sometimes by payment partly in cash, partly in funding bonds, and partly in blocked currency, which I think is the case in Yugoslavia.
We feel that all those different categories of default require consideration, quite apart from the provisions which affect the collection of Income Tax on securities which are not in default, and I would like particularly to refer to the case of the London and Provincial Trust, where funding bonds were issued of a face value equal to the face value of the defaulted coupons. That arrangement was made in 1933, and for three or four years the Brazilian Government continued to pay interest on those funding bonds, but latterly it has stopped doing so. The essence of the transaction was that when the coupon itself, we will say for£3 became due, the Brazilian Government, instead of paying that coupon, handed to the holder of the coupon a promise to pay £3 at some future date, and the court held that that was not payment of the interest; and I think it can hardly be disputed that it certainly was not payment of the interest, for since then the Brazilian Government has gone into default on the interest on that funding bond, and the likelihood of the principle of that funding bond itself being paid at maturity is very remote.
The second point that we wish to establish is that if, as regards the future, Parliament decides to legislate on such matters as these defaulted bonds and to deem as income what hitherto the courts have regarded as not being income, we feel that that could only be done under the most careful consideration and that Parliament should know exactly what it was doing. Thirdly—and this is the


strongest point of all—legislation with regard to these defaulted bonds should not be made retrospective. I shall leave it to hon. and learned Members who know more about the legal side than I do to deal with the very dangerous situation which may arise if these retroactive principles are applied without discrimination, but, in general, I would like to say that the business community as a whole regard these proposals with the very gravest anxiety.
A few weeks ago, when I was speaking in this House on the Budget, I ventured to make reference to some old-fashioned preconceptions which I entertained on the subject of the duty of Parliament to represent and protect the interests of the taxpayer, and I recall that my right hon. Friend who was at that time Financial Secretary to the Treasury adjured me to continue on that course. Well, here I am. I must say that in some respects I feel a little like Cinderella raking over the ashes of Parliamentary history to find whether any of the old embers are still alight, but I hope that my right hon. and learned Friends the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Attorney-General will not now leave me alone with my historical reflections on the duties of Parliament, and will not compel me to regard them as the two ugly sisters who go off to the ball and have a good time spending the money.

6.58 p.m.

Mr. Spens: May I supplement very shortly what my hon. Friend the Member for Hastings (Mr. Hely-Hutchinson) has said on this subject, but from a rather different point of view? This is an Amendment to the first of a series of Subsections which appear in this part of the Bill making all these Clauses from Clause 18 onward retroactive in their effect, and I would, first, like to say a word generally about the effect of Sub-sections in the Finance Bill which are designed to make effective as from a past date a change in the law of taxation. My own personal view is that where a Chancellor of the Exchequer, as have my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer and his predecessor, gets up in this House and warns persons that if they persist in a certain course, they must expect to find legislation brought in, and that that legislation will be retroactive in its effect, then I feel that we in this House have very

little reason to complain of the carrying out of that threat. But, on the other hand, when you come to cases founded on what has been a long dispute going on for five or six years between taxpayers and those representing them on the one side and the Executive on the other, as to whether or not the Inland Revenue has been right in the past in directing certain deductions of Income Tax at the source, or claiming direct assessments, and that develops after a great deal of discussion into one or more test cases deliberately brought to test the law, it seems to me that, when the Executive decides to change the law into the form in which it would desire it to be as from a past date, the House of Commons has to make very sure that the interests of the taxpayers, are not being unduly sacrificed to those of the Executive.
I want to associate myself again with what my hon. Friend has said as regards this group of Clauses. I do not want to reflect in any way on what was said in the courts, but there is no doubt that the decision in regard to these bonds went substantially further than the particular issues raised between the taxpayer and the Executive, and not only did the courts deal with the particular point brought to them for decision, but they also decided on collateral points which have been the accepted practice between the Revenue and the taxpayer and about which there had never been any doubt between the Revenue and any taxpayer that I know of. In these circumstances it seems to me that where you have a decision of the courts reversing what has been the accepted practice for a number of years, which unless it is reversed will involve the Revenue in having to repay a great deal of tax, and generally cause a great deal of disturbance, there is a fairly strong case for making your change of the law retrospective to some extent. But, when you come to an actual point in issue which has been deliberately fought as a test case, the circumstances should be considered very carefully and very fully in this House.
What does a test case mean? Why do we have test cases? To challenge the Revenue on a major point of real doubt in Income Tax law is a luxury which only a very rich man or woman, or a corporation with substantial funds, can embark upon at all, because once you


start a test case there is only one end to it, either in the House of Lords or by legislation at an early stage before the House of Lords decision has been given, but, generally speaking, anyone who starts a test case has to look forward to being taken up to the House of Lords and, if the final decision goes against him, the costs will be enormous. There has, therefore, grown up in these commercial cases, which are common talk amongst chartered accountants and solicitors throughout the commercial community, a system by which an arrangement is made that a particular case in the name of a particular individual or company shall be taken and the Revenue shall be challenged on that. Everyone throughout the commercial community knows that that is being done. Then, naturally, people in a similar situation to the actual individual or company which is the litigant make an arrangement with the Revenue that their right shall stand or fall with the final decision in the test case. That is exactly what has happened in these cases to which this Subsection refers. You had not only the litigants, not only the persons who had entered formal notice of appeal against similar assessments, or filed a petition of right in order to recover tax, but you had a great number of individuals who either directly or through their accountants or solicitors gave notive to the Revenue that they were awaiting the decision in these cases before they took other action. By that means you avoid a multiplicity of litigation on the same point as the test case and, quite rightly, in these circumstances the Inland Revenue assures them that according to the result of the case their right will be determined.
When, therefore, the case is not allowed to go to its conclusion in another place but, after the decision of the Court of Appeal and before the final determination of the House of Lords, legislation is introduced to deal with the point at issue, it seems to me that it is the duty of the House to make certain that those persons who are interested, and those who base their commercial transactions on the knowledge that the case was being fought, should be fully protected against the retrospective effect of a change in the law. It is because I consider in the main that this Clause does not fully protect all those who should be protected, and that it is impossible in my view to amend it in

detail, that I support my hon. Friend in suggesting that these words should be left out in order that at a later stage a proper Sub-section, drafted so as to protect all those who ought to be protected, should be brought in.
In my view it is impossible that legislation should not be retrospective to some extent. The Law Society and other bodies have been very concerned about the light-hearted way in which the House of Commons lets retrospective legislation go through, but I do not take the general view that you must never have retrospective legislation in connection with a change in the law of taxation. That may be theoretically perfect from the point of view of the lawyer but in practice it is quite impracticable. But I suggest that when we find retrospective provisions put into these Clauses altering the law of taxation, we ought to satisfy ourselves that full justice is being done to the taxpayer. It is because this Sub-section, as drafted, is far too narrow in the protection that it gives to those who would be affected by these decisions, that I think the Committee should strike it out and that my right hon. Friend should bring in another giving a wider protection in accordance with what might quite rightly be regarded as a promise by the Inland Revenue that they would be protected.

7.10 p.m.

The Attorney-General (Sir Donald Somervell): Everyone would agree with my hon. Friends who have spoken that legislation with retrospective effect requires in all cases the very careful scrutiny of the House and this Committee, but I think there are certain principles which have in the past been held not only to justify it but to make it right and fair. Although one cannot lay down principles in specific terms I think one can give an indication of their nature. One is that, if the decision of the court makes it clear that the law is different from that which everyone has assumed it to be, and rights, whether of the Government or of taxpayers, have been approved and transactions have been settled on the basis that the law was as it has been assumed to be, there may be a strong case for this House saying that the law shall be deemed always to have been what everyone has assumed it to be.
My hon. Friend who spoke first referred to the decision on which Clause 20


is based. That was a decision under which it was held that, if a foreign Government gave a bond in lieu of interest, the money's worth of the bond was not to be treated as interest. But it is implicit in that decision that, when the final date arrived and the capital value of the bond was paid up, that sum was to be treated as interest. Normally, of course, people have assumed that it was quite the other way and that the redemption of the bond was repayment of capital. Unless you went back and retrospectively made the law what it has always been assumed to be, the revenue would descend on the ultimate holder and say, "You thought you were getting £100 of capital. In fact you were getting £100 of the income of the person who originally held the bond. "That is an example to show that it is not just a one-sided principle applied to protect the revenue, but a principle of general application which may in certain cases protect the rights of the private individual just as much as the Government.
Although the Amendment seeks to leave out the whole Sub-section, my learned Friends agree that, so far as particular matters are concerned, this is a case in which Parliament should be invited to legislate retrospectively. In this matter I am in some difficulty. If I went into too great detail I should weary the Committee, and, if I went into too little, my hon. Friends might think I had not done their arguments justice, so I have to try to steer a middle course.
The point I want to make, first of all, in regard to the retrospective nature of these Clauses, is this. Broadly, everything that has been done is in accordance with practice. It is true that these particular cases were brought to dispute the practice as far as defaulting coupons were concerned. I have information to show that banks and others have always treated interest on defaulting coupons in exactly the same way as interest paid on coupons in respect of which there is no default. One may say that that is the view that everyone would normally take. Many of us may have had the good fortune in one sense, and the ill fortune in another, to have owned some bonds on which there was a partial default. Instead of getting £5, one gets £3but it has never occurred to any of us that that £3 was not income because

it was only part of the sum which, if all the obligations had been fulfilled, we should have got.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I think that it does occur to a number of people that it is not income.

The Attorney-General: All I am saying is that my information is that banks and others, and indeed the facts support it, treated defaulting coupons and bonds in this way until it was challenged, and deductions have always been made. I am not disputing that there are a number of people, rightly as it turned out, who contested the view that that deduction was in accordance with the law. That is why the case was brought. All I am saying is that the general practice has been to treat the interest on defaulting coupons in the same way as interest on non-defaulting coupons. That is an important point to bear in mind.
The other point that is of interest to us in considering retrospective legislation is to have a look at the particular merits and to ask whether these deductions are those which can be plainly shown to have been within the general intentions of Parliament in imposing Income Tax. In that respect I suggest to the Committee that we are on strong grounds in asking them to give these provisions retrospective effect. They all deal with money or money's worth which is given to someone who owns a security. To take the ordinary case, the terms of the security are written out on a piece of paper, on the bottom of which are a number of coupons or tickets which bear half-yearly dates. These are torn off one by one each half year and are negotiated, sold to a coupon dealer, or realised at a bank, or by some means or other they produce money or money's worth. I suggest to the Committee that the money or money's worth received in respect of interest coupons of that character is plainly income. The source, that is, the bond itself, remains. The fruit is in some cases the full fruit, but in some cases unattractive fruit in the form of blocked currency or in the form of bonds may be substituted. I submit that whichever form it takes it is plainly income, and the sort of income which this House clearly intended to come under the general provisions of the Income Tax Acts. I could, indeed, refer to past Acts to make clear that Parliament obviously did intend that these things should be included.
If that is right, it seems to me that we are justified in asking the Committee to give all these provisions retrospective effect, subject to the exceptions which we are making. My hon. Friend the Member for Hastings (Mr. HelyHutchinson) has told us that he was appealing for the taxpayer. I do not quarrel with that at all, but, after all, there are all the other taxpayers, apart from those who own bonds in respect of which there is a partial default. It is for this Committee to say that people who are in fact receiving income should, as far as possible, be treated alike. Suppose A. B. owned a large block of bonds on which there was a partial default, and two or three years ago received in respect of them £1,000 or £1,000 worth of income. He got it subject to deduction of tax. Clearly it was, from an ordinary point of view, income in his hand. If my hon. and learned Friend will not accept that he will put people who own this kind of security in a preferential position as compared with those who get £1,000 of income from bonds on which there is no default. Therefore, it seems to me that, dealing with this matter in this way, we are not asking the Committee to do anything which is unfair.
Just a word or two about the exceptions which are being made. In the case of anybody who has made an appeal against an assessment or is put in the same position as if he had made an appeal against an assessment, his rights are preserved. An assessment is made and in 21 days the taxpayer can object that he is being charged too much. He has not paid anything, and if he objects any rights of that kind are preserved. But there is also the position where we are dealing with a tax which has been deducted without objection in the past and in many cases years ago. The tax has been deducted and the money is in the hands of the Revenue. It seems to me that to allow claims either over the whole field or in a particular class of case to be made against the Crown for repayment of tax deducted in respect of something which is on ordinary principles income, and can only be described as such, would not be justified. My right hon. Friend in making the exceptions in paragraphs (a) and (b) has prevented any legitimate criticism being levelled against the general retrospective effect of

these provisions, which is not challenged in principle by my two hon. Friends.

Mr. Touche: Will my right hon. and learned Friend deal with the position of those who lodged claims before the test case of 1938?

The Attorney-General: If they were in a position to make an appeal against an assessment they will, under paragraph (a, iii), be exempted from the retrospective provisions. If their position was that they thought they were entitled to make a claim for repayment of tax, either already paid under the assessment or deducted, then the retrospective provisions prevents that claim being made.

Mr. Spens: Surely paragraph (a,, iii) refers to the former notice.

The Attorney-General: I give my hon. and learned Friend the assurance that these people will be in the same position as if they had personally made an appeal against the assessment.

7.29 p.m.

Sir John Mellor: My right hon. and learned Friend referred to those cases where there has been a partial default in payment of interest and funding bonds are issued in lieu. In some cases as my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Ashford (Mr. Spens) has mentioned, there has been default in payment of interest on those funding bonds. Is it the intention of the Government that the funding bonds when issued should be assessed for Income Tax on their money's worth at that time? If that is so, in some circumstances it might have the consequence that the Government would in fact reap a tax on something worth nothing. Suppose we get the case where funding bonds are issued in lieu of interest and the interest on those funding bonds is never paid and they are never, in fact, redeemed, the recipient will receive nothing in cash at any time. None the less, the Government will have assessed those funding bonds to Income Tax at their money's worth at the time of issue and will have received a tax upon something which in the result is not worth anything at all.

It being Half-past Seven of the Clock, and leave having been given to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed, without Question put.

BOMBING OF BRITISH SHIPS.

7.3o p.m.

Mr. Attlee: I beg to move, "That this House do now adjourn."
I am moving the Adjournment in order to call attention to the attacks made yesterday upon British ships and their crews and the refusal of His Majesty's Government either to afford them protection from such attacks or to take measures to prevent their recurrence. We debated this matter at length on Tuesday, when the Prime Minister stated that he was unable to take any effective action, but that he had sent a protest to General Franco. We now have the answer to that protest. We have the attack yesterday on two British ships off Valencia, the "Thorpeness" and the "Sunion." There is no doubt at all that these ships were engaged in perfectly legitimate trade. They had non-intervention observers on board, in one case a French observer and in the other case a German, and both of them, I am glad to say, were saved, for non-intervention observers have in the past been killed in pursuance of their duty on board ship. There is no doubt at all that these attacks were deliberate if the account given in the "Times" is at all correct. The "Thorpeness" was three-quarters of a mile from the port when attacked, and the "Sunion" was a mile from the "Thorpeness." One of the "Thorpeness" boats was smashed by a bomb. The master and the officers got into a boat and some part of the crew jumped overboard. The evidence is that these ships were attacked from a low altitude and that they were attacked not only with bombs but by machine guns.
Here is a case of two British ships attacked, of British lives endangered, and one British subject is missing. These attacks are a sequel to a whole series of attacks upon British ships. There is no need for me to set out the course of these infringements of international law and these attacks upon British lives and British shipping. My hon. Friend the Member for Derby (Mr. Noel-Baker), in what I thought was an admirably complete and lucid speech, dealt very temperately with these events and set out the facts, and the facts are not denied. The Prime Minister accepted the fact that these are cases of deliberate attacks upon British ships, that these British ships are pursuing their lawful vocations, and that

these attacks are made without any right whatever, and he has made his protest, but, he says, nothing can be done.
That is the position which faces this House this evening. The Prime Minister said that whatever might be the law, whatever might be the position, whatever might be our interests, whatever British lives might be at stake, nothing could be done. Oh, I forget. Since then we have had a remarkable suggestion by the Prime Minister. In answer to a question by the hon. and gallant Member for Clitheroe (Sir W. Brass), who asked if these ships could not be provided with anti-aircraft guns, the Prime Minister suggested that our mechantmen should provide them at their own expense. The Government are powerless to afford protection to British citizens in British ships, and so they can do it at their own expense. It is a most remarkable suggestion, and I should like to ask one or two questions upon it. What will be the position of these armed merchantmen? Will they have come kind of authority to carry arms upon the high seas? Are they to carry on a kind of private warfare? Will they be allowed to sail with these weapons under the Non-Intervention Agreement, because that, after all, is the sheet-anchor of the Prime Minister's policy? The ships that are sunk, the men that are killed are nothing, but we must keep to the policy of non-intervention. Are the ships to be given permits for these guns? Will the Government supply them? Will the Secretary of State for War, out of his abundance, supply these anti-aircraft guns at a price? If not, where are they to come from? It seems to me to be an utterly irresponsible suggestion, thrown out with no consideration whatever. [Interruption.]
The right hon. Gentleman made the suggestion as Prime Minister of Great Britain. He is very willing to talk about mischievous speeches and irresponsibility, but he sets on example of irresponsibility, and the mischievousness of his speeches can be judged by their effects. Every time the Prime Minister makes a pronouncement something or other like this happens. He made a great speech on Italy, and we had Germany walking into Austria. He made his speech on Tuesday, and we have two more British ships go down. I say there is no question whatever about what these British ships are


doing. They are engaged in perfectly legitimate trade—there is no question of contraband—and they are doing it under conditions laid down by His Majesty's Government in accordance with the rules of the Non-Intervention Committee.
The Prime Minister and the Ministers of other Powers must have some responsibility for these ships, because they are acting in strict accordance with the conditions laid down by a conference of the Powers. They carry observers, men who are performing duties on behalf of an international committee, and some of these observers carrying out this international duty under the British flag—they are not engaged in profit-making, so reprehensible in the view of some hon. Members opposite—are being killed. A Dane has been killed. I think the people of Denmark have some reason to complain as to why their observer should be killed. I note that a German observer is giving up because there is no protection. Surely it is rather ironical that an observer appointed to see that no material is imported by the Spanish Government to the detriment of the insurgents should be killed by the people whose interests he is serving.
The Prime Minister knows nothing about it, but where do these attackers come from? There is no secret about it. I have been talking to-day with two of the captains of these vessels, and there is no secret as to where these 'planes come from. They come from the Balearic Islands. They come from a base which is far away from the main battlefield, a base which is an island in that element which, hon. Members tell us so often, Britannia rules. These islands are in the control, we are told, of General Franco. According to the "Times," nationalist naval power is in eclipse. These islands are clearly at the mercy of the British fleet. They can be blockaded. Their aerodromes can be attacked. There is no Franco fleet worth mentioning.
The question is, Who are these attackers? There is much information to show that they belong to a foreign Power. I have talked with a British resident in Majorca who assured me that that island was completely in the hands of a foreign Power. The hon. Member for Derby gave a list of pilots, showing their nationality and the preponderance of subjects of a foreign Power. One of the

captains whom I saw to-day, telling me of a bombardment he underwent in the past, said the crew of the 'plane consisted of three Germans and a Portuguese. But this does not really concern us, because we have the Prime Minister's statement that we must take it that all these attacks are made by planes and pilots in the service of General Franco. That, of course, vastly simplifies our problem. If the Government takes any action there can be no complication with any other Power, because these 'planes and pilots belong to General Franco.
There cannot be any trouble with Germany or Italy. Both those Powers are represented on the Non-Intervention Committee, and they must feel as keenly as we do the attacks made on their representatives. Obviously, there can be no objection by Germany. Herr Hitler's bombardment of Almeria, a method which revolts us all, and which no one suggests we should copy, shows that she believes in taking action to defend her nationals and she did not think that that infringed non-intervention. And, of course, there can be no objection from Italy, because the Prime Minister and Signor Mussolini have come to an agreement. They made an agreement to be good neighbours. Such a good neighbour would not object to any assertion of a long-established right of a sovereign State to protect its own citizens. Therefore, it is clear that what we have to deal with is General Franco's forces and General Franco's fleet which, we are told by the "Times," is in eclipse.
The Prime Minister says that he cannot do anything about it. Let us look at some of his excuses. His first effort was quite characteristic. He asked what the attitude of the Labour party would have been, tried to shift the responsibility. Well, he cannot do it while he holds the position which he occupies. He has a responsibility. The question before this House is his attitude. As that is the kind of argument the right hon. Gentleman puts forward, I will also engage in speculation. What would have been the attitude of the party opposite if the late right hon. Arthur Henderson had come down to this House and made the kind of speech the Prime Minister made? We should have seen such a scene in this House as has not occurred for decades. I can imagine the hon. Baronet the Member for Bournemouth (Sir H. Croft)


bringing the roof down with his cries. The Press would have been running with denunciations of the craven poltroonery of the Labour Government and their indifference to national interests.
Let me recall an incident on 23rd October, 1904. There was an incident in the North Sea. By mistake—not by design—British fishermen were fired upon by the Russian fleet.

Captain Sir William Brass: Inside the three-mile limit.

Mr. Attlee: The question of the three-mile limit does not really arise here because the Prime Minister explained to us that he objected, and said quite properly that any bombing of these vessels within the three-mile limit was wrong. The "Times," a more independent journal in those days, said, in a leader:
The blood of our fellow-subjects peaceably pursuing their lawful business on the high seas, has been shed without the shadow of an excuse which can find acceptance with reasonable men. The nation claims its right not only to know that reparation has been demanded, but to know something of the shape in which the demand had been made.…We want more than indemnities and apologies."—
Mere protests would not have been enough—
We want… public punishment of the men who ordered a murderous attack upon our fishing boats. That is the best security we can obtain that earnest efforts will be made to prevent a repetition of such incidents in future.
I am glad to say that that matter, which endangered international relations, was settled by agreement. It was not settled without an acknowledgment of guilt, without reparation and without the utmost measures being taken to prevent a repetition of such incidents. There was no repetition.
The next excuse of the Prime Minister is that people who take these risks must look after themselves. He said:
Would they not have said that people who take these risks must look after themselves?…Yes, that is what we say about people who take these risks.
That is rather a new doctrine for the party opposite. We ought to let our people know that. Does that apply to people who invest their money in Mexico? Does it apply to the people who invested their money in Russia? Did the right

hon. Sir Joseph Chamberlain apply it in the case of the people who went into the Rand to make money? How much blood and treasure we should have been saved if the Conservative party had adopted this attitude all through the years; but, of course, it is not so. It is a hypocritical excuse. The Prime Minister does not believe that profit-taking is wrong. He would not condemn the deeds that won the Empire. Of course not. All through the history of this country, adventurous people have gone out for trade and they have appealed, generally not in vain, for the support of the Government of the day. I am sure that the Prime Minister would not assent to any doctrine of that kind.
Then he said that to protect our ships would be intervention. Really, you can stretch this doctrine of non-intervention very far. Why should it be an intervention to protect our nationals? He said that to tire on any aeroplane that approached our ships would be intervention. I suppose the danger is that we might by mistake attack a plane that was going to attack, not our ships, but the women and children of Barcelona. Nothing must be done to stop General Franco from winning the war, and rather than oause the slightest hindrance to General Franco's campaign we must let him sink our ships and kill our nationals. What does that mean? It means that a Nationalist administration in Spain is more important than the lives of British sailors.
Finally, he said:
We do not believe any practical means of preventing it, without adopting a policy which would be completely at variance with that which we believe to he in the true interests of this country, has been found.
What is that policy? Is it the policy that General Franco must be allowed to win?

Miss Rathbone: Yes.

Mr. Attlee: Is it the policy of the Prime Minister that at all costs we must do nothing that will offend Signor Mussolini? The Prime Minister then brought up his one serious argument—and it is a serious argument. He said that any action we took
might run the risk of involving us all in a general European war."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 21st June, 1938; cols. 940–943, Vol. 337.]


Everyone of us knows the dangers of a general European war and everyone of us would do anything to prevent it. The Prime Minister is not entitled to cover himself by vague general statements like that. We have a right to know what he is apprehending. I have shown that, on the Prime Minister's own admission, all we have against us is General Franco. Does the Prime Minister mean that if we took perfectly legitimate steps to bring pressure to bear upon General Franco for his piratical attacks upon British ships, some other Power would attack us? [An HON. MEMBER: "Answer that one."] If so, what becomes of non-intervention? Does he mean that General Franco is so much the protege of another Power that we dare not protect our own nationals? I want an answer to these questions. The House of Commons has a right to know just what is apprehended by the Prime Minister. I would ask the Prime Minister whether he has laid these facts before other Powers. He has had a good many months now of our ships being sunk and our nationals being killed. He has been in contact, close contact, with Signor Mussolini. Lord Halifax has been to see Herr Hitler. We meet the presentatives of Italy upon the Non-Intervention Committee. It has been quite easy to discuss these matters, and the right hon. Gentleman and the Government must have pointed out the serious state of national feeling arising from this succession of incidents.
Does the Prime Minister mean, when he speaks about a general European war, that someone would join in if we took any steps against General Franco? Is this country really unable to protect its nationals because of the threat of other Powers? I do not believe that it is impossible to take any action. Take the question of Majorca; it is quite possible for us to blockade Majorca. Why should any other Power intervene, if Majorca belongs to General Franco? Who is to step in? I would like to ask, if we continue to acquiesce, where this kind of thing is going to stop. Does the right hon. Gentleman know that there is something very near a blockade of Gibraltar? I was talking to-day to two captains who assured me that there were trawlers stationed in the Straits of Gibraltar and that as our ships go through they try to drive them off into territorial waters where they can be attacked. [HON.

MEMBERS: "No."] Well, that is the statement that these two captains make. If that is so, I would like to ask—[Interruption.]

Mr. McEntee: British lives are being lost.

Mr. Attlee: Suppose General Franco goes a step further. Suppose he bombs our ships while they are in the harbour of Gibraltar. Will this argument still hold good? Suppose he attacks Gibraltar. A British ship is as much a piece of British territory as is Gibraltar or any part of Britain and a British sailor is as much a citizen as any other citizen.
The Prime Minister's attitude is having serious consequences already in other parts of the world. I was reading in the paper that the Japanese are preventing our ships from going into Tientsin. I suppose they know it is quite safe; that there will be objections and protests, but nothing more. The Prime Minister must choose his course. There is something to be said for a whole-hearted policy of non-resistance; for saying: "Whatever happens, the very slightest risk of war must be avoided at all costs. The risk is so great that nothing must be done that would possibly offend any other State." But the logic of that is complete disarmament. It does not go with a vast expenditure on armaments. The Prime Minister himself has said that he is prepared to defend British interests, and we have tried very often to get from him an answer to the question, What are British interests? They seem to be narrowing week by week. I do not in the least believe that it is really because there is a fear of a general war that we do nothing against General Franco. The fact is that the Prime Minister has backed General Franco to win. He has made an alliance with Signor Mussolini, and in defence of that alliance he is prepared to sacrifice British interests and to sacrifice rights for which this country has stood for years. He is sacrificing a whole body of maritime practice and international law, as well as sacrificing the lives of British sailors.
What is the Prime Minister going to get in exchange? What promise has he had from Signor Mussolini? I am afraid that the Prime Minister has cut an abject figure. Everyone of us would do all we could to stop anything like war and anything that might lead to the danger of war. The Government have done all


they can to wreck the League of Nations and collective security, and have brought this country into the position of an armed State in an armed anarchic world. We know that this country is piling up munitions of war and that, in the opinion of some people, is running the risk of war. The Prime Minister must be much more specific before he will get this House to believe that he cannot protect the lives of British sailors. If he does say that, he is the first Prime Minister who has said it for over 100 years.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Hon. Members: The Prime Minister.

7.59 P.m.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Chamberlain): On the last occasion when we debated this subject I followed the speaker from the Front Opposition Bench, and thereafter the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir A. Sinclair) made a speech which was largely devoted to personal attack upon myself.

Sir A. Sinclair: There was only one passage in my speech, the concluding passage, which could possibly bear that interpretation. I sent a message to the Prime Minister before lunch that I was going to raise that question, so that if the Prime Minister wished me to speak in front of him I was quite prepared to do so.

The Prime Minister: I am not making any complaint about it, but in view of what happened on that occasion I thought on this occasion that the right hon. Gentleman might like to follow the Leader of the Opposition. It appears that, in the mood in which the Opposition find themselves, they prefer that I should speak at once, and I am quite ready to satisfy them in that respect. On the whole, I think the right hon. Gentleman made a speech which was perhaps less bitter and less intemperate than I had expected. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] I do not know why, but it was, although there were in it a good many rather paltry sneers. Of course it is pretty obvious that on this matter hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite have very deep and strong feelings, and in these circumstances it is perhaps rather difficult to get a patient hearing for the voice of reason. [Interruption.] The right hon. Gentleman says that there

is no reason, but, at any rate, there are attempts at reason. The other day I was very much interrupted, and certainly had not a very good chance of pursuing a connected argument. I do not know whether I shall be any more fortunate this evening, but, whatever the result, I ask hon. Members in all parts of the House to remember that they too have their responsibilities, as well as Members of the Government, and that, when they are touching on subjects which may bring us near to that dangerous borderline which divides peace from war, we ought all to remember those responsibilities, and ought not merely to look at the circumstances of the moment, but to think also of the possible consequences of any action that we may take to the lives and fortunes of our fellow-countrymen. Great indignation has been expressed by Members of the Opposition at the attacks upon British ships and at the destruction of British property—a matter on which they have not always shown such enthusiasm. They should ask themselves in this matter whether their motives are entirely unmixed, and whether it is solely indignation at the destruction of British property or the risk to British lives that has moved them in this matter. From the very beginning of the Spanish conflict, the Opposition have offered the most persistent and sometimes embittered opposition to the whole policy of non-intervention—

Mr. Attlee: That is perfectly wrong. The policy of non-intervention was accepted by the Labour movement until it was shown that it was absolutely one-sided. [Interruption.]

Mr. Whiteley: On a point of Order. I heard an hon. Member opposite say that the scene which has just taken place in the public gallery was arranged by the Opposition authorities. That is not true.

Hon. Members: Withdraw !

Sir W. Brass: I only suggested that that might be so.

Hon. Members: Withdraw

Sir W. Brass: In view of the fact that it is not so, I willingly withdraw.

The Prime Minister: I was saying that the Opposition have from the beginning opposed the policy of non-intervention. The right hon. Gentleman says that that


is not so, and that there was a period during which they accepted it. All I can say is that it was very short, and, as time has gone on, they have made it clear that they object to the policy of nonintervention for the simple reason that their policy would be a policy of intervention. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] They cannot help viewing every question and every incident as it arises from this angle: "Does it or does it not help the side in which we are interested?" The right hon. Gentleman professed once again that he did not know what the policy of the Government was. We have made it, I think, sufficiently plain to ordinary people that our governing motive in this matter is not a preconceived feeling in favour of one side or the other. [An HON. MEMBER: "Ask Lennox-Boyd."] Our policy has been to try to preserve the greatest of British interests, namely, peace, and, all through, the object of the non-intervention policy has been to avoid what we conceive to be the inevitable result of intervention, namely, an extension of the conflict beyond the shores of Spain until it became a general European conflagration. That has been our aim all through. The right hon. Gentleman opposite said that it is his aim, too. Then all of us, since we have that aim in common, should take care that we are not diverted from that aim by any provocation, whether it comes from the benches opposite or whether it comes from attacks on British ships.
The right hon. Gentleman spoke of the facts, and said that I accepted them. But he did not give all the facts; there are other facts besides those which he mentioned, and we must keep them before us. The first fact to which I would draw attention is that long ago we issued a warning to British shipowners and British ships that, while we would undertake to give them the fullest possible protection so long as they were on the high seas, we could not undertake to give them protection if they carried cargoes into territorial waters in the area of hostilities.

Mr. Shinwell: Then why did you protest?

Mr. Speaker: The Leader of the Opposition has moved the Adjournment of the House in order to make an attack on the Government, and surely it must be

right to allow the Government to give their answer without interruption, especially from the front Opposition Bench.

The Prime Minister: After that warning was given, many shipowners abstained from carrying on trade with Spanish ports, although some of them had been in the habit of carrying it on before. Others disregarded the warning; and there were others, again, who were attracted by the high freights which are always associated with trade of that kind to enter into this trade. I do not know whether hon. Members happened to notice an article in the "Daily Herald" a little while ago, in which a considerable amount of space was devoted to the exploits of a certain Jack Albert Billmeir, who was described as the world's newest king. This is what it said:
When the war broke out —
that was the war in Spain—
Jack Billmeir owned two ships. Now he owns 23. At a time when other shipping companies were fighting shy of trade with Spain, he stepped into the breach with his little Stanhope Steamship Company…Then he started buying ships—little ships, big ships, any old ship, just as hard as he could go…The risks are enormous. Insurance premiums at Lloyd's may be as much as 20 or 25 per cent. The Spanish Government charters all these ships, and pays at a flat rate for every ton carried. Sailors on board usually get £2 bonus for the risk. … When the war first broke out Billmeir—plain Mr. Billmeir in those days —ran his little business from a smallish office in Bury Street, E.C.2. Now, as his work becomes more and more extensive, he has had to take over half a floor in a vast new building off Bishopsgate. In that office sit men guiding the activities of a whole fleet between here and the Mediterranean.

Mr. Maxton: That is very wicked.

The Prime Minister: That is the description in the "Daily Herald." I do not know that it is witty.

Mr. Maxton: I did not say it was witty; I said it was very wicked of this man to do that.

The Prime Minister: Wit is so often on the lips of the hon. Member that perhaps I may be forgiven. The article concludes:
Refusing to be worried either by the insults of the gossip-mongers or by Mussolini's warplanes, old King Billmeir goes majestically onwards.
I am not saying that there is anything wicked in this. It is a case of a man who


sees an opportunity of making profitable voyages, subject to certain risks; he goes on and builds up a considerable fleet from nothing, and apparently is prospering. But I ask whether it is really claimed that this country should go to war—

Mr. Attlee: With whom?

The Prime Minister: —or take action which might conceivably involve us in war in order to give protection to people like this, who have gone, for purposes of making profits, into this risky trade, in spite of the warnings of His Majesty's Government. There have been, since the war began, a number of British subjects who have been themselves engaged in hostilities on one side or the other. Some have not been engaged in hostilities at all, but they have been engaged in medical work or ambulance work, which is very necessary for military operations, if it is not a military operation itself, just as supplies of coal or wheat or oil are necessary to maintain military operations although they are not military operations themselves. In pursuit of this work, these men that I speak of have run risks, not for profit—they went to fight for principles in which they believed so intensely that they actually decided to go and strike a blow for them themselves—a very honourable thing. Many of them have been killed, but I have not heard any protest from the other side, or any of these demands that the British Government should involve the British people in the risk of war on their behalf.
I want to know what is the difference. I see no difference in principle between the case of these men who were engaged in those operations on one side or the other, and those who are running these harbours, except that in the one case it was done out of high principle only and in the other was done for profit. Hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite protest very loudly when I say that action is demanded which might very easily lead this country into war. [HON. MEMBERS: "With whom?"] I am going to examine that question presently. But I am going to say, first of all, that that is not my view only. I would remind the House that it is not the view of the ship-owning community generally that the Government are not doing their duty by British shipowners. I am not sure that this was not quoted the other day by

my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary from the "Journal of Commerce and Shipping Telegraph," but it is very appropriate for my purpose and I will read this one sentence:
There appears to be only one 'simple' solution, and that is, to declare war on General Franco, but one seriously doubts whether the country would rally round any British Government which commenced hostilities purely in answer to an appeal made on behalf of shipowners who send their ships into ports after being warned that the risks they run are their own and not the responsibility of the British nation.
Let us consider for a moment what hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite would have us do. I confess I was left in some doubt by the speech of the right hon. Gentleman as to what his policy would be. He always semed to put it in an indefinite form—this might be done, or that might be done. He suggested that there was no reason why we should not blockade Majorca. But a blockade of Majorca, if Majorca be the place from which these planes come, would not stop the planes from coming. There is another plan, the plan of the right hon. Gentleman sitting opposite. He goes straight to the heart of the matter, and makes no bones about it. He says, "I would bomb the aerodromes in Majorca to pieces." That is a policy. It is not a policy that the country would support. I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for having said so plainly what it is he would do. There is no question about him. In his 76th year, he is ready to plunge the country into war.

Mr. Lloyd George: On the contrary, in my opinion it would stop war, and it would stop this bombing of ships. I am perfectly certain it would stop it; and especially after what the Prime Minister said to-day, that it was a Franco force. Therefore, you are not attacking any great Power at all. You would be putting an end to the whole of this business, and putting an end to the risk of war.

The Prime Minister: If we bombed the aerodromes, which the right hon. Gentleman thinks are Italian aerodromes, in Majorca—

Mr. Lloyd George: You said they were Franco' s.

The Prime Minister: But you said they were Italian. The right hon. Gentleman cannot have it both ways. I say that that is the way to start a new European war.


That is the view of the country in general. We have the responsibility—it does not now rest on the right hon. Gentleman—and we are not going to take the risk. I want to know whether the right hon. Gentleman is advocating the bombing of aerodromes in Majorca or not?

Mr. Attlee: I have to take these things on information given by the Government. The Government have told us that these are entirely Franco planes. When the Prime Minister wants to deal with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) he says that they are Italian planes and that that might involve us in the risk of war. He cannot have it both ways. If he will make a plain statement and put his cards on the table I will tell him what we would do.

The Prime Minister: If there is any doubt I will attempt to clarify my statement. It remains to be seen whether the right hon. Gentleman will follow that up by putting his cards on the table. He says that he would not go to war with Italy, but that he would with Franco.

Mr. Attlee: I never said anything of the sort. I will tell the right hon. Gentleman. There is a risk of a general war. I pointed out that, if as a matter of fact this was merely General Franco, there could not be a risk of a general war; and I have stated my opinion that the blockading of Majorca—because aeroplanes, after all, have to have oil, and there is no oil in Majorca—would be an effective measure to stop this bombing. I do not believe that General Franco would declare war on Great Britain.

The Prime Minister: I am satisfied from that statement that the right hon. Gentleman is prepared to take warlike action against General Franco in the sure belief that it would stop there. Can any responsible Member of this House think that it is safe to rely upon such a hypothesis as that? In the course of the Debate on Tuesday last I listened with great interest to a speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Norwood (Mr. Sandys), in the course of which he examined very carefully a possible course of action. He asked that his proposals should be considered sympathetically, and I must say I thought that that was not an unreasonable request, put forward in the way that they were and in view of the

arguments which my hon. Friend used. What did my hon. Friend wish to do? He said that he did not propose that we should bomb areodromes in Majorca, but he did wish that we should not exclude retaliation.

Mr. Sandys: Reprisals.

The Prime Minister: Well, reprisals. I do not distinguish between the two. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] If there is a distinction, let us call it reprisals. He agreed that it was not possible to take serious exception to the case of a ship lying alongside a wharf which could not easily be distinguished by an aeroplane flying at a great height from the adjoining town. In the case of ships lying away from the wharves, in the roads or in the harbours, if a deliberate attack was made, and especially where machine gunning was employed, then, he said, action could be taken. What was the action that he proposed? "I will demand compensation not at the end of the war, but now." That could be done, of course. But supposing compensation were refused or not paid, we are back again in the old difficulty, and my hon. Friend quite saw that, because he said emphatically that he would have us resort to reprisals. That is to me the most interesting part of his speech, because I wondered whether there were reprisals which he had in mind which had not occurred to the Government, and he suggested reprisals of one of two kinds—either the seizing of a ship belonging to General Franco, or the impounding of property belonging to General Franco whether in the form of goods, or money, or securities. I am glad that he did not include in his reprisals the suggestion that we should send a warship to bombard a port in the possession of General Franco. That was the form of reprisal which was adopted by the Germans after their battleship was bombed, but the criticism made upon it at the time was that it was punishing the wrong people, and that is the criticism which we should make on similar action being taken to-day by whomsoever it was taken. Therefore, that is ruled out.
To go back to the two suggestions of my hon. Friend. It is no use to threaten a man with a weapon which is going to break in your hand when you try to use it. The difficulty about the situation is that neither of these weapons can be relied upon not to break in our


hands, and for this simple reason. There are far more British ships in the ports of General Franco than there are ships belonging to General Franco on the high seas or in British ports. And when you come to impounding property of General Franco, you have to remember that, in the territories controlled by General Franco, are industries in which British capital is invested to the tune of some £40,000,000, so I am informed.

Mr. Gallacher: Big profits.

The Prime Minister: It is, therefore, perfectly obvious that it would be very easy for General Franco to retaliate in kind to a greater extent than our original action, and we should be forced back again to the old position. Of course, it is always in our power to take action. We are a strong Power and General Franco is a weak one, and if we were prepared to use our force against Franco, then that would be a different matter altogether. But then we are back again in the same dilemma. If we started warlike action, whether it were against General Franco or against some objective of which the ownership was doubtful, who could tell that we could stop our operations there, and it might be the beginning of another European war. The British Government have always made a distinction between attacks on British ships which might be called accidental inasmuch as the ships were near some military objective and that a hostile aeroplane, aiming at that military objective, might unwittingly involve a British ship in the attack—we make a distinction between that kind of attack and an attack deliberately aimed at a British vessel. There have been a number of cases, as I stated on a previous occasion, when all the evidence seemed to us to make it clear that those attacks were deliberate. In such cases we have made the strongest protests—

Mr. Gallacher: You are frightened of them.

The Prime Minister: —and we have, of course, reserved our right to compensation. But, on the other hand, General Franco has in the most emphatic terms denied to us that he ever had any intention of deliberately attacking British ships, and that such action—[interruption].Perhaps I may be allowed to

make my statement. Hon. Members opposite really cannot expect to have uninterrupted opportunities of speaking if they are going to continue in this way. The Burgos authorities have stated that any such action would be entirely inconsistent with their desire, which they have often affirmed, to maintain friendly relations with His Majesty's Government. It may be remembered that in my statement on the 13th of this month I said, what was quite obvious, that it was impossible that attacks, frequently involving loss of life and sometimes apparently deliberate, on British ships, could be repeated without serious injury to the friendly relations which the Burgos authorities said they wished to have with us. I should like to repeat that warning.
As the last two attacks, which we are discussing to-day, appear to us, on the evidence we have so far, clearly to come into the category of deliberate attacks, we have, as I announced at Question Time, requested the Burgos authorities to give us an explanation of their action which is, on the face of it, entirely inconsistent with the assurances and the professions that they have made to us. We take a serious view of these attacks, and we have instructed Sir Robert Hodgson, our agent at Burgos, to ask that this explanation should be given to us without delay. We have directed him to return to this country as soon as he receives the reply, in order that His Majesty's Government may consider, in consultation with him, the situation which will result from the terms of that answer.
The right hon. Gentleman has asked that I should state the position of the Government with clarity. He said that I must choose my course. I see no reason whatever to depart from the course which the Government have laid down. We intend to follow the policy of non-intervention which, at the moment, appears to present a brighter chance of achieving success than perhaps at any other previous moment in its history. We do not intend to change the terms of the warning which we have issued to British ships.

Mr. Attlee: I should like the right hon. Gentleman to explain in more detail his proposal in regard to anti-aircraft guns for ships.

The Prime Minister: I have made no proposal. I did not make any proposal


in regard to anti-aircraft guns, I said that was a matter for the owners and not for the Government. If the right hon. Gentleman is asking whether the British Government are prepared to issue arms to merchant vessels, the answer is, definitely, no.

Mr. Attlee: That is not the point. The hon. and gallant Member for Clitheroe (Sir W. Brass) asked whether these ships could be provided with them, and the right hon. Gentleman said, no, they must provide them themselves.

The Prime Minister: I said it was a matter for the owners.

Mr. Attlee: Are the Government going to give any facilities, having thrown out that suggestion?

The Prime Minister: No, I am not sure that the right hon. Gentleman did not put his finger on the important point when he asked whether it was possible, in view of the non-intervention arrangement, for these vessels to arm. I am endeavouring to sum up the position of the Government, and I say once again that we are not going to change the policy which we have announced to the House and the country with regard to Spain. We believe that that is the right and proper course in the best interests of the country. We believe that that is the course the country desires us to take. We believe that if British ships still continue to go into territorial waters for the purpose of making these high profits, they must take the risk and they must not seek to throw upon others responsibilities which we are not willing to undertake.
As regards these particular attacks, I deplore them. I hoped that the warning which I uttered a little while ago would have been heeded by General Franco. I trust, at any rate, that it is not too late for him to issue such instructions as will prevent the recurrence of these incidents. As to what may take place in the future, I can only ask the House to wait a little longer until we have received the reply of the Burgos authorities and have had an opportunity of considering it.

8.42 p.m.

Sir Archibald Sinclair: The Prime Minister said that the subject which we are debating to-night brings us to the dangerous borderline between peace and war,

but it is not we who are raising the issue; the issue is being raised by events outside. For my own part it seems to me that the policy which the Government are following is undermining the foundations of peace and bringing us ever nearer to a more dangerous crisis. I agreed with the Prime Minister when he said that it was important that we should be careful what we say, but I think it was particularly unfortunate that in one of the opening passages of his speech he gibed at the Labour party for being hypocritical, as he alleged, in their wish to defend British interests and British property. I should have thought that such a desire in any party was not a subject for gibing but rather a subject for encouragement from a responsible Government. The Prime Minister asked whether there was nothing else behind this agitation. There certainly is. There is grave anxiety respecting the sanctity of treaties and international good faith, which are the foundations of peace.
The Prime Minister went on, in what I thought was one of the most astounding passages of his speech, to ask what was the difference between those who were fighting in the International Brigade for the principles in which they believed, and those who were carrying on peaceful commerce between this country and Spain, I suggest that there is this difference, that those who have gone to Spain from this country to fight for principles in which they believe have gone in defiance of a Statute passed by Parliament. Those who have gone to trade with Spain have gone in accordance with the will of Parliament. There is a difference, too, between men who are fighting according to the rules of war and are killing men on the other side, and must themselves take the risk of being killed, and those who are engaged in peaceful commerce, attacks upon whom are piracy, and nothing less. There is a difference between men who are fighting for a cause in which they believe under a foreign flag, and men who are steaming in ships under the flag of Britain, to which they are entitled to look for protection.
Are His Majesty's Government—and this seems to me to be the first of the big issues raised in this Debate—prepared to acquiesce, apart from verbal or written protests, in the establishment for the first time in history of an air blockade by air terrorism on the coast of


Spain? If they are prepared to acquiesce in that, it may bring terrible consequences for Britain. It seems to me that it is not in the interests of a great maritime Power like Great Britain, depending as we do for our very lives in the event of war on the free passage of merchandise and goods, to acquiesce in such blockade. There is no country in the world which has a greater interest than Great Britain in standing firmly against this new horror and terror of air blockade by air bombardment on peaceful commerce. Can we so well afford to lose these ships? I leave out of the question the lives of the men with which I will deal later, but can we afford to lose these fine ships? One of those sunk yesterday was a vessel of nearly 5,000 tons. It is quite true, as the Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade pointed out the other day, that the fewer ships we have the easier it is for the Navy to defend them, but I am not quite so sure that Parliament wishes the task of the Navy in warfare to be simplified quite so rapidly as has been the case during the past few weeks. The Prime Minister says that he deplores these attacks. He deplores them, but he encourages them by making it clear that they can continue, and that however much they continue, however greatly they are intensified, he is not going to abandon what he calls the policy of non-intervention to which the Government are firmly and irrevocably attached.
I want to make one proposal, at any rate, to the Government which cannot possibly involve this country in war. I want to make two or three proposals, but let me put this one first. It is a proposal which might certainly influence the mind of General Franco and could not possibly involve war. It is this: The status of General Franco at the present time in international law is that of a bandit. We have not accorded him any belligerent rights. I am not arguing whether it is right or wrong to accord him these rights, and if he was not dependent for assistance on foreign arms he would have a strong case for being accorded belligerent rights. But we have not accorded him these rights, and for good reasons. Therefore, his status in international law is that of a bandit but, nevertheless, the Government have agreed, and I agree with the Government, that on certain conditions we might recognise his belligerency against

the Spanish Government. But even if we did so General Franco would have no right to bomb and machine-gun defenceless British sailors engaged in peaceful commerce with Spain. The man who uses machine guns for killing British sailors engaged in peaceful commerce with Spain is just as much a gangster as the American gangster who uses machine guns for his own purposes in America, and General Franco has no more right than the gangster or racketeer to recognition of any belligerent rights.
The Prime Minister said that he had made a strong protest to General Franco, and warned him that these actions if continued would do serious injury to the friendly relations which the Prime Minister believes General Franco wishes to establish with this country. That was said To days or a fortnight ago, and many British ships have been sunk since then. What serious injury has been done—perhaps the Prime Minister will tell us—to the relations between General Franco and this country? What has happened as the result of his disregarding the Prime Minister's warning? Have these events made any difference to the intention of His Majesty's Government in certain circumstances to recognise and accord rights of belligerency to General Franco? I ask this question: Are His Majesty's Government prepared or not to acquiesce in an air blockade of Barcelona, and, if not, surely they are not prepared to accord rights of belligerency to General Franco who is endeavouring to impose this blockade by bombing and machine-gunning British sailors.
What follows from this warning about the serious injury to the relations between General Franco and this country—only a few more notes. What has happened to these notes? Have they gone to the wrong address? Have they perhaps slipped off General Franco's table into the wastepaper basket alongside? I was going to ask whether they had been answered, and, if so, what answer has been received, but that is hardly necessary. We have seen the answer in the newspapers this morning. Why does the Prime Minister stubbornly refuse to uphold the honour of the flag and protect the lives of British sailors? Is it that Signor Mussolini would think him mischievous? The truth is—I said it when the Prime Minister was here last Tuesday,


and the Leader of the Opposition has repeated it in slightly different words this afternoon—that the Government by concluding the Anglo-Italian Treaty have got themselves into a position when they must not only want General Franco to win but want him to win quickly.
I do not want to dwell upon the Prime Minister's extraordinary answer to the hon. and gallant Member for Clitheroe (Sir W. Brass) about the arming of merchant ships. I think it has been made quite clear that the Prime Minister did not mean anything at all. He said that it was a matter for the owners to consider, and he has now told us that if the owners came to the conclusion that they wanted to arm their ships the Government would have to refuse to supply them with guns and would have to tell them that putting guns on ships would be contrary to the Non-Intervention Agreement. The Prime Minister said that he had not had much time to consider the matter. All these considerations ought to have been threshed out by the Government weeks ago. Every method of defending British shipping attacked by these illegitimate means ought to have been threshed out, and it is treating the matter with levity to come down here and say that it is a matter for the owners to consider. As a matter of fact, I had intended to address to the House a rather more careful argument on this subject than now appears necessary, and I looked up what Oppenheim has to say. He remarks that:
The encouragement even of defensive hostilities on the part of private vessels is a retrogressive step.
That is even in war time. Surely we are rattling back into barbarism if our sailors cannot rely on Government protection against piracy and have to be told that they must arm their own vessels in peacetime.
British sailors are being killed, and I say that the Government should make up their minds whether this trade is legitimate or not. I do not want to hide my opinion. My own opinion is that it is amply legitimate. The Prime Minister mentioned the case of Mr. Billmeir—I had never heard of him before—and seemed to be shocked about Mr. Billmeir and what he had done. Why, he is like the man in the Bible who had four talents and turned them into eight—he has turned

two ships into 23. I cannot understand why the right hon. Gentleman should quarrel with him for his enterprise or suggest that because he has done this, because he has maintained our export trade with Spain, thus rendering a service to this country, and supplied the Spanish people with goods which they badly need, thus rendering a service to the Spanish people, he has forfeited the right to be protected against piratical attacks by General Franco. But let the Government make up their minds: either this trade is legitimate, or it is not. If it is not legitimate and if British sailors are losing their lives merely in order that a few rich men may make speculative profits out of them, I say that the Government ought to stop it; and if it is legitimate, they ought to protect it.
The Prime Minister makes out that nothing can be done. We have been told that for many years past. First, nothing could be done to protect enterprises in which we were engaged because we were disarmed. Now, after spending hundreds of millions of pounds to increase the Army, the Air Force and the Navy, we have not yet got quite strong enough to speak firmly to General Franco. Then we were told that, after all, we could not be the policemen of the world, we could not protect other nations, we could not be expected to enforce the rule of law in every quarter of the globe; but, it was said, let a single armed foreigner touch a hair of an Englishman's head or set his foot on British territory, and then the National Government would show the world what they were made of. I say that a British ship under the British flag ought to be at least as sacred as the soil of Kenya or Tanganyika. Yet British sailors are being killed and ships sunk and the Government are still unable to take action.
I have made one proposal, that General Franco should be warned that if this conduct continues, any question of recognising his belligerency will be put aside indefinitely. My second proposal is one which I made on Tuesday last, but which the Government did not answer—I make it again. Will the Government ask Signor Mussolini to associate himself with their demands to General Franco that this bombing should stop? Will they address that demand to Signor Mussolini? Surely, to do that could not provoke a war? I heard the Prime


Minister say that Sir Robert Hodgson was to be brought home for consultation. I hope the Prime Minister or the Under-Secretary will make it quite clear to us to-night and to General Franco in due course that Sir Robert Hodgson will not return to Spain if British ships are still being bombed.
Then, I put this question frankly. If all these courses do not avail, what next? I noticed that in one passage of his speech, the Prime Minister traversed the proposals that had been made by the hon. Member for Norwood (Mr. Sandys). The Prime Minister thought they were very mild proposals and very interesting ones, because they would not provoke a war. The right hon. Gentleman asked, "If they did not avail what would happen then?" He said that we should be back where we are now. But let me ask the Government—and this is the opportunity to ask it, because in five weeks the Recess will begin—what will happen if, when Sir Robert Hodgson has come back and these protests have been made, General Franco refuses to give satisfaction? Then, certainly, in reprisal we should sink one warship for every attack which General Franco makes. [Interruption.] I deny that that would mean war. [Interruption.] The Prime Minister seems to be allocating to himself a new function in our Parliamentary proceedings. I have heard of cheer leaders in American universities, and I notice that the Prime Minister is now allocating to himself the function of laughter leader. Certainly, there is in my proposal this safeguard against its provoking war. If we were to say to General Franco that next time he sinks a ship, we shall send our Navy out to sink as many of his ships as it can find, that might conceivably—I do not say it would —provoke war; but if we were to say that next time he sinks one of our ships or bombs or machine-guns one, we will sink one of his, then that would not necessarily mean war; it would mean a definite, limited reprisal.
If that were not successful, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) that we should go to the place from which these aeroplanes come. If it is fair for them to drop bombs on, and to torpedo and machine-gun our peaceful

seamen, why is it not fair for us to pay them a visit and drop bombs on their military aerodromes? There, again, I do not say that we should go constantly until the aerodromes had been reduced to ruins —I am not speaking for the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs, but for myself—but that we should make one visit for every visit which Franco's airmen make to our ships. The Government are so frightened that we might find ourselves at war with Franco. Is it not possible that General Franco might feel just a little trepidation about being involved in a war with the British Empire?

Mr. S. O. Davies: Not with this Government.

Sir A. Sinclair: I will make one more comment on the proposals I have made. For my own part, I must confess that I think non-intervention has broken down, but I put it to the House that the proposals which I have made are proposals that could be adopted within the framework of the non-intervention policy. There would be nothing in a reprisal such as I have suggested that would prevent the Government from continuing the nonintervention policy if they so desired. It would be a reprisal limited entirely to dealing with this urgent problem of attacks upon peaceful British shipping. It would not touch the non-intervention policy.
In conclusion, I say that firmness would pay us. It paid us at Nyon; we cleared the high seas by our firmness at Nyon. It paid us the other week in connection with Czechoslovakia; the firmness of the Czechoslvak Government, of France, Britain and Russia saved peace. I believe that we shall have to pay a terrible price for the Government's weakness which will everywhere, in Spain, Italy and Germany, lower British prestige, imperil British lives, weaken respect for international law, and by doing all these things, it will still further undermine peace.

9.5 P.m.

Captain McEwen: I was very glad to hear the right hon. Baronet the Leader of the Liberal Bench, in agreement with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) on at least one point. The right hon. Baronet agreed with his right hon. Friend


that it would be a good thing to bomb the aerodromes in Majorca, in reprisal for attacks on British ships. I could not help reminding myself when I heard those right hon. Gentlemen agreeing with each other on that point, of a remark made by a former Liberal leader in a public speech not long before his death. The late Lord Grey of Falloden, speaking of preventive war, said very emphatically that he was never in favour of lighting a small fire in order to put out a large one.
I regret that at an earlier stage this afternoon, when the question which we are now debating first arose, I was not privileged to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker, because I was anxious at that time to voice an opinion which I am sure is shared by nearly all of us on this side of the House and by the vast majority of those outside the House, and that opinion is one of entire agreement with the policy of the Government which has once more been laid down this afternoon. I must admit that within my limited powers I am tempted to reply in kind to some of the attacks which have been made from the other side, not only this afternoon but on previous occasions. This is a case, the very nature of which, unfortunately, is to generate heat. No one, I presume, supposes that indignation against these attacks on vessels flying our flag is confined to any one party or any one section of British opinion. The matter is, in fact, even more galling to those of us who sit on this side of the House, than to anybody else. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] Because we are on the Government side, and we have responsibility for dealing with it. But to suggest that the Prime Minister is lacking in patriotic feeling is not merely unjustified but ridiculous.
What are the facts? Our ships entering the war zone in Spain are being attacked. Hon. Gentlemen opposite want us to take drastic steps to prevent a continuance of those attacks. Why, then, have His Majesty's Government not done so and why are they not doing so now? Not surely from fear, as has been suggested in some quarters. That is an unworthy suggestion to make in connection with one's own countrymen. Nor is it from a desire to favour one side more than the other. Nor is it from any callousness in face of the deaths of British seamen. It is not from any such motives at all but from common-or-garden sense.
There are, unfortunately, those in the world to-day whose dearest wish it is to see us all involved in war—and that for tortuous reasons best known to themselves. It is the plain business of any statesman worthy of the name, to see that such wishes are frustrated. Let it be granted that many, even a majority of these ships are going about their legal and lawful affairs. Whatever the ships may be, if they fly our flag and are attacked on the high seas we are all agreed that they are entitled to all the protection which they can possibly want or which we can give them. The question then narrows itself down to what happens in territorial waters. Let us see what steps can be taken.
In the first place, it may well be that the time will come when we shall have to defend them wherever they are. There are, after all, limits to the long-suffering of a great nation under provocation. [HON. MEMBERS: "What limits?"] Before then they might be allowed, as has been suggested, to carry anti-aircraft guns. But it is doubtful whether, in many cases, the structure of their decks is such as would allow such guns to be carried, and it is equally doubtful whether the skill of those who would be in charge of the guns would be sufficient to prevent raids being carried out upon the ships. They might be escorted into territorial waters by His Majesty's ships of war, but I ask hon. Members opposite, what view would General Franco's supporters take of that action. They would say, and not without reason, "Here are the British, the protagonists of nonintervention and the only people moreover, who have faithfully observed it, aiding and abetting certain ships in running supplies to the beleaguered garrison which is now Government Spain." We would in fact, from that moment, be involved ourselves in the war, and I do not believe that this country intends or desires to be so involved. Moreover, we do not know all the facts. It is a question which has yet to be made clear whether these aeroplanes may not be Government aeroplanes with disguised signs. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] We are dealing with a war and with a new arm and that is a possibility which we have to take into account.
Lastly, precipitate action in international affairs is nearly always regretted later. Most of us possibly have seen


recently in the cinema, a version of what happened with reference to a former and not wholly dissimilar case when two gentlemen, Messrs. Mason and Slidell were seized by one side in the American Civil War and all England was shouting, just as hon. Gentlemen opposite are shouting to-day, for immediate and strong action. It will be remembered that only the act of the Prince Consort in toning down the diplomatic note which was sent on that occasion saved us from war. That was not done from fear, because the result of a war of that kind, had it been undertaken, could not have been in doubt. Nor was it done from partisanship. It was done from prudence, and no one to-day has anything but praise for the Prince Consort's action on that occasion.
So, I say, let us go warily lest we jeopardise the future not merely of this country but of the world. Let us give the man at the helm the chance to weather this hurricane in his own way. There never was a time when patience and reasoned judgment were more needed than at present. The aeroplane is a new weapon. The rules governing its use are only in process of being formed, and in any case our manoeuvring ground is nothing more than a narrow plank suspended above an abyss. If I may be allowed, in parenthesis, a personal reminiscence, some years ago when I was in His Majesty's service abroad—it was in Rome—I fell ill of influenza, a rather serious attack. The Italian doctor who attended me, apart from very ordinary remedies which he suggested, used at every visit to repeat two words"Pazienza; coraggio;" — "Patience; courage." And it is advice which I think we would do well to take to heart now.

9.16 p.m.

Miss Rathbone: I think no one would claim that the Prime Minister, either the day before yesterday or to-day, has done anything but skilfully evade dealing with the specific suggestions which have been made. I have taken the trouble to analyse the extremely interesting speech made by the hon. Member for Derby (Mr. Noel-Baker) at the commencement of the Debate on Tuesday, and I find that he made no fewer than eight definite suggestions. To most of those the Prime Minister made no reference at all, but

completely ignored them. The hon. Member for Norwood (Mr. Sandys) made a suggestion, to which I think the right hon. Gentleman did make some reference, and other suggestions were made by other hon. Members. Let me first take the minor suggestions. The Prime Minister brushed aside the suggestion of the hon. Member for Derby that Sir Ralph Hodgson should be withdrawn and that the Duke of Alba should be given his conge. Now he has gone one step in advance of that minor suggestion and told us, if deliberate attacks continue, not that Sir Ralph Hodgson will be withdrawn permanently, but that he will be asked to come back here to discuss what sort of reply should be made to General Franco.
I understand that a fortnight and a day since the Prime Minister used the phrase that these attacks cannot be repeated without serious injury to our friendly relations with the Burgos authorities no British ships have been attacked, and most of them sunk, and in the case of three of them, by the Government's own admission, it has been done deliberately. Therefore, since this incredibly mild warning, that if these deliberate attacks on British ships, which have resulted in the killing of some 50 British seamen, were continued, there would be serious injury to our relations with the Burgos authorities, we are told, not that those friendly relations will be severed, but that if it goes on, well, we shall have to do something about it, and we will at any rate discuss the matter with Sir Ralph Hodgson. That is the way that the Prime Minister treats these mild suggestions.
Several other suggestions of a more drastic character have been made, and the Prime Minister concentrated upon the most drastic of them, and that was that of the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George), that the aerodrome at Majorca should be bombed. I noticed that the Prime Minister avoided making any reference to the suggestions which were made that we should engage in some sort of reprisals, and that is surprising, because most of the experts, either from the naval point of view or from the point of view of international law, have definitely given their preference to method of reprisals. I would like to challenge the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, if he is going to reply,


to state what is the objection of the Government to the method of reprisal suggested by Admiral Usborne, who is by no means a friend of Republican Spain, in his letter last week to the "Sunday Times," in which he said that, although he did not want it done, it would be both easy and effective to seize or sink one of General Franco's ships for every British ship that was deliberately attacked. I must say that that seems to me to be the most practical suggestion that has yet been made.
I understand that General Franco has a very small fleet of warships and a rather larger fleet of vessels in his mercantile marine. He cannot afford to lose them, because many of them have to pass backwards and forwards through the Straits of Gibraltar. Is it impossible to seize them and, even without seizing them, to impound them and to hold them so long as this bombing continues? Again, General Franco has funds in this country. I do not know how much, but what is the difficulty in the way of impounding them? There are other methods of reprisal, one of the most practical of which is that referred to by the right hon. Member for Caithness (Sir A. Sinclair) to-day. Why cannot the Government intimate to General Franco that there would be nothing doing in the way of granting belligerent rights if a single further British ship was bombed?
Then there is another threat that could be made, that there would be nothing doing about keeping the French frontier closed unless the bombing stopped. We all know that it is only due to strong pressure from the British Government that the French frontier control has been tightened up, before there was any need for it under the Non-Intervention Agreement. The suggestion was that the French frontier should be closed as part of the general system of control, of closing the Portuguese frontier, and of the resumption of sea control, but the French Government have closed their frontier now because strong pressure has been brought to bear upon them from London.

Captain McEwen: How does the hon. Lady know that?

Miss Rathbone: I think we all know it. Is it not perfectly incredible that if the British Government had wished to

stop this bombing, they would have refused to take any positive step, either for a direct or a more indirect and, I think, more practical method of reprisal, which is perfectly justifiable in international law, as the professor of international law at Oxford said in an article only to-day in the "Listener"? Is it credible that if the Government had been in earnest, they would not only have taken no positive steps, but that while these outrages were going on, and getting worse day after day, they would have gone out of their way to make several fresh concessions to General Franco and brought pressure to bear upon Paris to close the French frontier, as well as another form of pressure which has excited very little attention but which seems to me to be peculiarly reprehensible?
The other day at the Non-Intervention Committee the representatives of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics most reluctantly gave way to the pressure which was put upon them by Paris—we all believe because of pressure again from London—to withdraw their very reasonable proposal that, as part of the resumption of the system of sea control, there should be an observer in every port in Spain. I thought there was something very significant in the way that the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics were bullied into withdrawing that proposal. Why? Is there a single precaution, if the Government are in earnest about the new form of sea control, that is more obvious and more easily carried out than—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker (Captain Bourne): I must draw the hon. Lady's attention to the fact that the Adjournment has been moved in order to call attention to a definite matter of urgent public importance, namely,
the attacks made yesterday upon British ships and their crews, and the refusal of His Majesty's Government either to afford adequate protection or to take measures to prevent their recurrence.
The hon. Lady cannot claim to be dealing with the Non-Intervention Committee in this Debate.

Miss Rathbone: May I point out, Captain Bourne, that it is relevant, because I was discussing methods of preventing their recurrence, and one of those methods which I have suggested is that the British Government should, on the


Non-Intervention Committee, refuse to put forward or to advocate any proposals that were advantageous to General Franco? They have not only not used their position in the Non-Intervention Committee to put pressure on General Franco, but they have used it to secure a great advantage for him.

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That is exactly the point that I have said the hon. Lady cannot raise upon this question.

Miss Rathbone: I must obey you, Sir, but I thought we were ranging rather at large—everyone else has done it—over the whole question of how to stop the bombing. You must either stop it directly or by some form of reprisal, and I was trying to survey the various forms of reprisal and pointing out that not only have they all been neglected, but that during the period when the bombing was going on the Government had gone out of its way to heap favours on the undeserving head of General Franco. What conclusion can the House, the British public and the public of every country that is watching this observantly, draw? The Government is not taking any steps to stop the bombing because it does not want to stop the bombing, and we all know why. The Prime Minister is not seriously concerned to stop it because he has given himself a vested interest in an early Franco win. Did we not all have a feeling almost of horror when some weeks ago he used the term "pull off the Anglo-Italian Agreement"?
When the Prime Minister got rid of the late Foreign Secretary because he wanted to take Italian negotiations into his own hands, he made it as clear in Rome as it is clear to everyone of us that he was staking his political reputation and his future on carrying out that agreement. In order to do that he has to bring about a settlement in Spain. He knows that no settlement will be accepted which does not involve a Franco win, and therefore he wants a Franco win. I hope the widows and orphans of everyone of the 60 men killed will realise that they were sacrified on the altar—[Hon. MEMBERS: "Withdraw."] I could not tell in public of all the Members who have said in private conversation, "Of course, the whole thing is plain. The Prime Minister has to give way to Mussolini in

every conceivable way because he has got to pull off the Anglo-Italian deal, and this is part of the way he is doing it." It is terribly plain. The thing that continues to puzzle me is why in the world the French Government go on playing—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: The hon. Lady is getting wide of the very narrow issue.

Miss Rathbone: I must be obedient to your Ruling, Sir, but we are discussing the whole question of how this can be stopped. I am wondering why it is that the French Government is playing the Prime Minister's cards for him. I wish they would give up behaving like a wife who will not buy a new dress till she has her husband's leave. France is as important to our security as we are to hers, and if only France would do the right thing, we should have to follow. Instead of that, they are behaving as though they have to do everything that Whitehall tells them to do. We ought to show more courage in the matter. The Government are playing a terribly dangerous game. They play on the fears of the people whenever any of us suggest not only showing firmness before the dictators, but even speaking openly to the tin-pot, third-rate dictator, Franco. The Government are doing their best to bring up the British people into the habit of sheer cowardice, and sooner or later they will pay for it, because when the time comes when they want the British people to follow them and stand up for what they think vital interests, they will find that the people have learned their lesson only too well.
My constituency stretches from Durham to Bristol and has a pretty large proportion of the younger intelligentsia in it. There is no question that has ever taken such a hold on the heart and imagination of the young intelligentsia as this cause of Republican Spain. The Government owe a great debt of gratitude to Republican Spain. It is the one thing that has awakened people from the dangerous pacifism that they were in three years ago. Enthusiasm for the Spanish people's gallantry has done that. Now they are beginning to see that the Government are behaving with cruel treachery to Republican Spain, and, when they ask us to fight for what they think is some British interest, they will find it very difficult to get the British public to follow.

9.32 p.m.

Mr. Raikes: Unlike the hon. Member, I represent a constituency which contains very few of the younger intelligentsia, but it contains as large a number of working men and women as almost any other in the South of England, and they are the people who, in the event of war breaking out, would suffer a great deal more than the younger intelligentsia. It is very easy to criticise the policy of the Government. I have listened with hope to some of the suggestions that have been made to remedy the bombing of British ships, and the more I have listened the more convinced I have been that there are many occasions when the remedy can he worse than the disease itself. I should like to consider certain of the suggestions that have been put from the other side of the House. The Leader of the Opposition made only one suggestion. He waved away the idea that he might make any at all. He said it was, of course, a matter where the responsibility rested upon the Government itself. But if you have not a better alternative than the Government's policy, you are, by attacking that policy, risking the welfare of the country as a whole. His one idea was a blockade, the same form of policy that was advocated on these benches only about two years ago, but instead of cutting off oil for aeroplanes, they wanted to cut the Suez Canal and make sure of war at a time when we were even less prepared than we are at present. [An HON. MEMBER: "They did not do it!"] No, because fortunately hon. Members opposite did not have the chance.
Then we come to the right hon. Gentle man the Member for Caithness and Sutherland (Sir A. Sinclair). He, of course, was full of suggestions in the old Liberal style. First and foremost, he apparently failed to realise what is one of the cardinal points of our policy. We are not, as he suggested, picking a quarrel with any shipowner who wants to send out his ships to Spain, but we on this side of the House, at any rate, are not prepared for the sake of the profits of these gentlemen to cast not only the younger intelligentsia, of whom the hon. Lady is so fond, but the working class into a war of which no man or woman could tell the end. It is suggested by the right hon. Gentleman that it is rather disgraceful on the part of the Govern-

ment that they are not prepared to provide armaments in order to put anti-aircraft guns on the ships that are sent to Spain. Surely if we are pursuing the policy, which we have pursued all through the last two years, of advising merchantmen not to poke their noses into Spanish ports, it would he a contradiction in terms to advise them not to go and at the same time to provide them with guns.

Mr. Cocks: Why, then, protest against the attacks on them?

Mr. Raikes: The answer is simple. We may think it is inadvisable for these ships to go into troubled waters, but that does not mean that we like to see them bombed. In the last resort, if a question of real vital interest to Britain were to arise, we should be bound to go to war. It is obvious that we do not regard trade with Spain as a vital interest.

Mr. James Griffiths: Will the hon. Member be kind enough to tell us what he and his party regard as a vital interest for which we would go to war?

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: I think we had better not pursue that subject.

Mr. Raikes: Of course, I bow to your Ruling, but I think the Opposition will bear me out in saying that I do not think I have ever refused to give a fair answer to a fair question. In the circumstances, I will pass from that with the remark that whatever may or may not be a vital interest obviously trade in Spanish waters, in which we have advised our ships not to engage for the last two years, cannot be of vital interest. We should not otherwise have given that warning a considerable time before ever the bombing started. Then there was the suggestion, which the hon. Lady made, in regard to taking ship for ship. Apparently either she was not present when the Prime Minister spoke, or, if she was, she failed to hear his answer to that suggestion. He said that that form of reprisal had been considered and rejected. If you were going to impound capital there was more British capital in Nationalist Spain than Franco capital in Britain. The same thing applies to the question of merchant ships.

Miss Rathbone: Is the Prime Minister or the hon. Member suggesting that Franco could take a merchant ship of ours as easily as we could take a merchant ship of his?

Mr. Raikes: What the Prime Minister suggested was that a good many more ships of ours were in Spanish waters than ships of Franco in ours.

Colonel Wedgwood: Our ships would not go to Franco's ports if there was a risk of their being seized by Franco in retaliation for our sinking his ships.

Mr. Raikes: The seizing of ships would give rise once again to that high tension in Europe which has pretty nearly calmed down. We know, of course, there are powers behind both parties in Spain, but what we realise even more is that the temperature of Europe has gone down slightly from what it was three months ago. This is not a time when we want to run any risk except for vital interests. There is a further suggestion of which I should like to get the real implications. It was suggested by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Caithness and Sutherland, and also by the hon. Lady, that we should say to General Franco, "You will never in any circumstances be granted belligerent rights unless you stop bombing British ships. "Hon. Members opposite have said time after time that they found it difficult to imagine any reason why a bandit like Franco, as they have described him, should be granted belligerent rights, and to that suggestion coming from them Franco might very well say, "Thank you for nothing. "If, on the other hand, the implications behind that suggestion are that you will grant Franco belligerent rights if he does not bomb British ships, it may be a good or a bad idea, but it would be a proposition. The other is not a proposition at all. It is merely saying that we will not do what we do not want to do anyway. What effect that would be likely to have I do not know.
There is a further point with regard to the question of belligerency. We have been told time after time that the Prime Minister and the leaders of the Government and, therefore, this country have been deliberately pulling down the scales on the side of Franco and that we have gambled on Franco winning the war. If we had done that and if that were the object of the Government, why did they not a year ago grant Franco belligerent rights, which, with his command of the sea, would undoubtedly have weighed the scales very much down on his side? An hon. Member opposite said that the

French Government objected to it, but, as the hon. Lady said, the French Government follows on the tail of this wicked Government and in her peroration said how miserable it was that France was tied to the tail of England. She cannot have it both ways. Having granted belligerent rights—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker: That, again, is getting outside the scope of this Motion.

Mr. Raikes: Of course, I bow to your Ruling. I admit I was getting a little outside the narrow limits. One of the difficulties with regard to the question of bombing and of territorial waters is that not unnaturally a Government which covers about two-thirds of Spain and is a belligerent in law even if not actually feels the desire to prevent the export of various forms of food, of coal, and of other things which are going to its enemies, and which, if there were actual belligerent rights it would be able to deal with in the ordinary way except in so far as the question of air bombing is concerned.
In that respect we come up against another difficult problem. It will probably be admitted by most hon. Members that if you allow air bombing on a military target, that is to say, if you permitted the bombing of military objectives, you have the right to bomb harbours which are naval objectives. If you are to have the right under air bombing—and the international code has not been revised very much since the advent of this new weapon —to bomb harbours, it is quite impossible for ships which go into those harbours to avoid the likelihood of being bombed, and to suggest that if at any time Barcelona or Valencia or any other harbour were being bombed and British ships which were moored up to the quay were hit it ought to be a reason for taking steps which might lead to war, it is going a great deal further than the people of this country would be prepared to accept.
One thing which has shown that more clearly than anything else has been the reaction of the population in at any rate two out of the last three by-elections which have been fought, particularly the one in which that great expert in dealing with General Franco, the right hon. Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) spoke. To put it in a nutshell, we hate the fact that there has been the bombing of British ships, but we on this


side are not prepared, and the country is not prepared, beyond that to risk the possibilities of a European conflagration for the non-vital interest of protecting a set of shipowners who know the danger they are incurring, who are earning very considerable profits, and a number of whose vessels are British only in name.

9.47 P.m.

Mr. Churchill: I should always differ from my hon. Friend the Member for the neighbouring division of South-East Essex (Mr. Raikes) with much reluctance, because my hon. Friend and I have cooperated and collaborated in other Parliaments and on other topics, and it certainly could not be suggested of him that he does not form his own opinions irrespective of party pressure, or even of constituency pressure. He forms his own opinions, and he gives his counsel truly as he conceives it to be his duty to do. Therefore, I differ from him not only with personal reluctance but, on general grounds, with some anxiety. Nevertheless I do not think that my hon. Friend was well advised to point to the recent by-election as a sign that the people of this country were entirely upon the side of the foreign policy of which we are having another example to-day. If he would examine those by-elections carefully he would, I think, see that it would be better not to cite them as evidence of popular opinion, but in any case I do not think this matter, which is so very grave, should be settled by reference to the fortuitous incidents and accidents of by-election contests.
I listened with great attention to the very powerful speech which the Prime Minister delivered. Certainly no one could mistake the general basis from which his argument arises. I should be altogether unfair to the right hon. Gentleman if I did not fully admit that many of the considerations which he has advanced must appeal to all of us. It is not so much a question of the facts that causes the difference as the question of the emphasis which should be put upon particular facts, and I must say that I thought the Prime Minister did not sufficiently present to the House and to the country the gravity of the offence of which we are the victims. Sir, it is a very painful injury and assault to which we are being subjected. Over 50 British ships, I gather, have been molested, eight or nine have been actually sunk—12 have

been actually sunk—many of them inside the three-miles limit but others outside. They have been sunk by a method of warfare which we have always regarded with great abhorrence. According to all the laws and customs of the sea the sinking of vessels by an agency which has not the means of taking on board the crews has always been regarded as an outrage upon the long traditions of the sea, and all our views in the past have been expressed in that sense.
These vessels were not carrying, in most cases, munitions of war—cannon or explosives; very frequently they were carrying food supplies. Of course, food supplies may be made contraband of war, but we have not recognised any process by which the supplies which these ships were carrying could be impugned in any way. Moreover, most of these ships were sailing under the seal and charter of the Non-Intervention Committee, and they had non-intervention officers on board, officers collected from all countries to see that the rules which the Non-Intervention Committee have laid down should not be broken. These agents and observers were on those ships, vouching for the innocence of those ships from any breach of the processes to be adopted—not upon the authority of His Majesty's Government only, but upon the authority of all the great nations which have been gathered together around the table of the Non-Intervention Committee.
If in these circumstances 50 or even more ships flying the British flag, engaged in a traffic not only lawful in the name of this country but lawful in the name of many countries, are to be assailed by a brutal, inhuman form of attack which leaves their crews, if the vessels founder, at the mercy of the elements, it constitutes a very grave offence, and I feel that there ought to be some spirit in His Majesty's Government and in this House to commend to the nation the wrong that is being done. The Prime Minister, in his speech two days ago, said that to have our ships sunk like this was not a very nice thing. There is always a certain latent power in understatement, and I think I can leave the remark at that. No, Sir, it is not a very nice thing, and it is not only a question of the incidents, of the examples, which confront us, but it is the general basis upon which these incidents proceed, and the consequences of our accepting them


in general tolerance, as we are doing. Why, Sir, we are debasing, or we are acquiescing in the debasement of, a currency which we have defended for generations, and when we affect to ignore the fact that the British flag is not giving protection to persons proceeding about their lawful vocations under the authority of Parliament, we are debasing a symbol which has hitherto been regarded as of great practical consequence to the British realm and the British Empire, and one well worth making sacrifices and running risks to defend.
I say it with pain, but I believe it to be true—and I will await contradiction from any part of the House—that no other great naval Power would tolerate such treatment; Japan, Italy, Germany, the United States, no other great naval Power, would submit to this kind of treatment for long, month after month. More than that, I say that no agency or force in the world would dare to offer them such treatment. I feel that that is a most grave fact. I speak, I believe, without incurring any great difference of opinion when I say that no other Government that I have ever seen, and no other Parliament in which I have sat in nearly 40 years would, I am sure, have felt itself forced, or been willing, to cast these outrages all off as if it were a mere question of some profiteering Billmeir.
I have endeavoured to consider the various arguments which have been advanced by His Majesty's Government or advanced on their behalf from whatever quarter. Of course, Ministers might come to the House and say: "We have allowed our defences to fall so low that we are not able to give His Majesty's lieges protection, "but they have not said that yet. Perhaps that argument is to come. Then there is the argument, the one which figures most, of bogus ships, the Billmeir argument. That, of course, introduces a new element into the discussion. One thinks of the Union Jack and one is confronted and affronted when Mr. Billmeir is brought into it. I think that this special case might easily tend to divert the judgment of the House from the true course on which it should go. I have felt uncomfortable for some time about ships being transferred rapidly to the British flag, and have felt that it

might conceivably involve us in very serious responsibilities on account of their action. In fact, I wrote privately to the late Foreign Secretary about it before the Nyon business occurred.
The remedy for ships being transferred to the British flag, all of a sudden and in a hurry, with just the limited number of persons necessary to qualify under the Board of Trade regulations, is to amend your Merchant Shipping Act and not to allow your flag to be insulted. The Government could amend the Merchant Shipping Act at any time, and in my opinion they should have done so, when they saw that difficulties were arising in this respect. They should have specified certain dates and conditions which had to be fulfilled. If they had done it, their position would be all the stronger because they would be able to insist upon effective protection to their traders who went forward under perfectly normal conditions. I could not follow the argument of the Prime Minister when he tried to suggest that there was no difference between volunteer combatants on either side, who go, as was pointed out by the Leader of the Liberal party, contrary to the express law of this country, and fight and try to slay an opponent in the field of war, and a ship, a peaceful ship, that goes on trade under the authority of the Non-Intervention Committee and the law of the land, to carry food to a Spanish harbour.
There could be no two cases, as a matter of fact, that you could bring forward for the purposes of more effective contrast. The right hon. Gentleman is so very keen a reasoner and is so very patient always, I must say, in dealing with the House, not only in Debate but at Question Time, always endeavouring to argue a matter out, that I must suggest to him that after the excitement of this Debate is over, if he will examine this particular argument in cold blood, he may find that it is one which his armoury should not have included.
There is another argument, which I will call the long-range gun argument, although it is not one that has been used to-night. It says that if a seaport town is under the bombardment of an enemy, and a gun is fired 10 or 15 miles away, or even more, it may hit ships in the harbour; and that an aeroplane is only another method of carrying the projectile that is fired from the gun. I hope that


the House will not entertain such an argument. Nothing could be more detrimental to us than that we should seek to legitimise and confirm and, as it were approve —I agree not in words, but by our actions —this process of unregulated bombing from the air. Merchant ships of all kinds are involved. No country in the world has a greater interest in preventing the air blockade or the air bombing of neutral ships.
The Prime Minister said, quite truly, that the air raises many novel problems. Of course it does, but what solutions are we proposing publicly for those problems? What principles are we affirming and what precedents are we creating? Are we really creating and affirming the principle that if neutral ships go with food to a harbour of a country at war it is a legitimate act, or an act that we cannot resist, and has to be accepted, if those ships should be bombed from the air? What consequences might this principle not have to ourselves, when our small food supplies are absolutely dependent in a very large proportion, upon neutral ships as well as upon British ships seeking our food ports in time of war? As far as I can make out, on the reasoning which is now put before us, if we were at war with a European State and we had the command of the sea, and therefore the enemy could establish no blockade in any legal sense, and if the United States sent foodships to our country and those ships were bombed by long-range aircraft from the European State, our view, on this Debate and on the position which the Government have taken up at the present time, would be that those ships had got no more than they deserved for shoving their noses in. It is of the most extreme importance that the orientation of British policy in these matters should be carefully considered. We are legitimising, or at any rate acquiescing in, methods which not merely insult our flag—I suppose we must let that go in these days—but strike at the very life of our community.
One must refer to the suggestion which is made that the Opposition take a special interest in this matter because they wish to see the Spanish Government win. It is difficult for human beings to disentangle all the motives which lie in their minds, but I am bound to say I have found a counter-opinion among some of my own

friends that we should go easy in this matter because it is thought that British interests will be served by General Franco winning. I think we might leave those arguments to cancel out on both sides. For my part, I have tried studiously throughout this Spanish business to be neutral as between the two parties. It seems to me that it would be a very great misfortune if the British Government were to adopt a policy which could be recognised by all the democracies of the world as having perhaps struck a finishing blow at the resistance of the Spanish Republic, which resistance is inspired, not only by their zeal for their cause, but by the probability of very cruel punishment if they are defeated.
I must address myself to the question which is asked, "What would you do?" [An HON. MEMBER "Hear, hear!"] I am sure my hon. Friend does not suppose that I should shirk that question, but that is just what His Majesty's Government are doing. They are asked what is to be done, and they say "Nothing." They say that there is no remedy, and there is no limit to the number of ships that will be sunk, as far as I can gather from anything that my right hon. Friend said to-night. There is no remedy; we have to lump it; we have to put up with it; we have to go off and believe it never happened; we have to shut our eyes and hope that something will turn up to divert our minds from this most painful topic. It is not for the Government to ask what should be done, they should come forward with a clear policy. But it certainly is not a possible conclusion that nothing should be done, no matter how far or how long the provocation may go on. Here it is only 50 ships—only 50; but at any moment a vessel may be sunk with really heavy loss of life, and all the arguments which have been used to-night could presumably be deployed in that case.
The Government ought not to ask what should be done: they ought to provide a solution which would enable them to carry out their duty, namely, to give reasonable protection to His Majesty's ships and lieges and to the British flag when these are acting under the full sanction and protection of the law. But if we are asked to assist the Government by offering suggestions, I would hazard a very simple suggestion. I suggest that my right hon. Friend the


Prime Minister should use his personal influence with Signor Mussolini. I have never under-rated the force and importance of the policy for which my right hon. Friend has worked so long and has undertaken so much exertion, but he largely based his commendation of it to the House upon the faith he had in Signor Mussolini's sincere desire for the friendship of the British people. I suggest that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister should, through whatever channels are available—and we know, that when there is need for them, all sorts of channels are available—ask Signor Mussolini to leave no stone unturned to prevent a recurrence of this air bombing outrage, and to make it quite clear that he has done his utmost to stop it. I am sure that, if he does that, a very great obstacle will be removed to friendly relations between Great Britain and Italy.
One has to apprehend, however, that, after my right hon. Friend and his gallant confrere have done their best, General Franco may still remain obdurate, that he may refuse to mitigate his wrath in any way, and that, consequently, we may be. thrown back upon the final resource. I see no difficulty in that at all. If everything else has been tried, I think it could be perfectly safely said to General Franco "If there is any more of this, we shall arrest one of your warships on the open sea." If they like to resist, that is a question for them, but that, I believe, could be done with perfect safety if everything else had been tried, and I cannot believe it would bring Europe into a general war at the present time. I can quite understand undergoing humiliation for the sake of peace. A great country like ours, with its long history, so very splendid in past periods, could submit to a succession of humiliations, perhaps rightly, in order to create an atmosphere favourable for peace, and I do not agree with those who say that a spark should be allowed to set alight the passions of great nations. Therefore, I would have supported the Government in bearing some humiliation, and asking us to undergo it, if I felt that we were making towards greater security for peace. But I fear that this abjection is woefully misunderstood abroad. I fear it will weaken our influence and power to avert war, and that, so far from making for greater security for peace, it will actually bring

nearer to us all those dangers which in all parts of the House we desire above all things to withhold from our people.

10.13 p.m.

Mr. Ede: I desire to intervene in this Debate at the representative of the seaport of this country which contains the second largest number of registered seamen. Quite frankly, I am not interested in the fate of Mr. Billmeir, but I am immensely concerned for the seamen of all grades whose lives have been lost and are being daily risked as a result of the policy of His Majesty's Government. On 3rd June I went to my constituency at the request of a large number of my constituents who are not normally my supporters, because they desired to hear my views on this subject, and I can assure the Prime Minister that the wives and relatives of the men who hourly risk their lives in the ships that are now trading with Spanish ports are by no means convinced by any of the reasons that he has adduced for the British Navy and British statesmanship being unable to fulfil their historic task of saving British lives endangered in such circumstances as now exist. It is a matter of daily terror and anxiety for these people, and, no matter what profits may be made by other people, these lives deserve the attention and the respect of the Government.
We never have a Bill dealing with the Marcantile Marine before this House but Members on the other side pay tribute to the services rendered, in war and in peace, by the Mercantile Marine in building up the security and prosperity of this country; and the circumstances which now surround this particular trade call for those eulogies being given some practical effect in the policy of the country. It does not matter when you are pleading for British seamen—the only matter with which they are concerned—[HON. MEMBERS: "Call your own side to order."] I was not calling anybody to order; that is a matter for the Chair. I was only drawing attention to the fact that the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Under-Secretary, who may reply to the Debate, were engaged in a conversation while I was pleading for my constituents. Attention has been called more than once in recent weeks to the fact that when back-benchers are speaking the Government seem to consider that they do not count, and apparently that is agreed on the other side.


Anyhow, the loudest cheer I have heard in this Parliament was when the First Lord of the Admiralty announced some months ago that the first of these ships had been sunk. The attitude of hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite, and of the hon. Member for Smethwick (Mr. Wise), whose constituency may have a few barges on the canal but has no seamen going to Spain, is quite consistent with that policy.
I speak with heat on this matter because men from my constituency have been killed, sailing under the British Flag. A captain sailing from my constituency was ordered by a Franco ship, when he was an hour's sail out of Gibraltar, to put back into Gibraltar. He wirelessed for help, and there was none forthcoming. Has this House, which in former days included men of the names of Drake, Raleigh and Grenville, fallen so low now that a Spanish pirate can order British ships on their lawful occasions to put back to ports, and be supported by the hon. Member for Smethwick? These men, after all, had been going through t very difficult time before this situation arose; and if an ordinary seamen declines to sail in a ship that is going to Spain, will he be allowed to draw his unemployment benefit, having been offered a job and refused it, because the Prime Minister is not sure that he can protect him when he is inside territorial waters? These are the things that men and women are asking themselves in the humble cottages of the great seaport towns in this country. I am glad to know that Smethwick is safe. It is near to Birmingham.

Mr. Wise: Will the hon. Member allow me for a moment, as I probably shall not get an opportunity of replying in full? For some reason, he seems to have singled me out for a personal attack. As far as I am aware, I have made no comment of any kind in the course of this Debate, I have not expressed my views on the Spanish conflict in this House for the last six months; and I would like to know—not that I mind very much, but out of pure curiosity—why he has referred to me?

Mr. Ede: The hon. Member interrupted me. He has been sitting with a smile on his face—that is, perhaps, paying a compliment to his facial contortions during the whole time I have been pleading for the lives of my constituents, and if he had

not interrupted me I should not have regarded him as of sufficient importance to waste a single second upon him. The right hon. Gentleman's father was once attacked by a German for having said something that the Germans did not like. His reply was, "As I read history, no British Minister has ever served his country faithfully and at the same time enjoyed popularity abroad." In the atmosphere of to-day it is impossible to' be popular in Rome and save British seamen sailing into Spanish ports. The right hon. Gentleman has to choose. Unfortunately, our fear is that he has chosen, and the result of his choice is, widows in the seaports of our country and anxiety, hourly and daily, in the homes of the men who sail the seas and upon whose hardihood we have depended throughout our history for our safety. It is a deplorable choice, and one can only hope that the time has not yet passed when it may be re-made to the advantage of our seamen.

10.22 p.m.

Mr. Wise: I think that I should possibly reply a little more fully to the hon. Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) who, as I pointed out a short time ago, for some reason or other, has singled me out for special attack, saying, I think, that I was smiling while he was pleading for the lives of British seamen. [An HON. MEMBER: "That is true!"] I can only commiserate with the hon. Member on his eyesight, because I am sure that those with clearer vision on the same benches will tell him that those grimaces existed rather in his own fertile imagination. A stricter attention to the saner forms of rhetoric would make his utterances far more valuable in this House when he chooses to make them. There is nobody who does not sympathise with the British seamen who are in danger and who does not realise that the hon. Member representing a seaport town possibly has some special responsibility, but it is possible, I can assure the hon. Member, to ruin a case by over statement. I would remind the hon. Member, because we must be frank on this occasion, that these seamen who are sailing to Spain would not be denied unemployment pay if they refused to go on a ship sailing to Spanish waters. [interruption.] If hon. Members doubt that let them write to the Unemployment Assistance Board and ask.

Mr. Aneurin Bevan: Does the hon. Member know that unemployment assistance is not unemployment benefit?

Mr. Wise: I have only five minutes, so I cannot go into details, but I would like briefly to refer to the representations advanced by the right hon. Gentleman who spoke first in this Debate. He spoke with great heat and great enthusiasm, but in the end he practically left us where we were. It was suggested by various hon. Members, particularly by him, that we might bomb General Franco's aerodromes. [HON. MEMBERS: No."] Well, he agreed with the suggestion made elsewhere. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I think the point was that he did not follow the suggestion that we should shell Spanish towns. I think that came from either the "Daily Herald" or the "News Chronicle." That is a form of retaliation which has been undertaken by Herr Hitler and it would be unworthy of this country.
I suggest that hon. Members should take a little more heed of the Prime Minister's statement. We have always undertaken the full protection of our ships on the high seas, but with only one exception in history, and that was in relation to the Port of Montevideo, we have never provided protection inside the territorial waters of other countries. My right hon. Friend the Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill) made light play of the long-range bombardment argument, but it is not what he would have us believe. The aeroplane is a long-range gun. I regret that the bombing of British ships has not ceased, but there is a probability that they will cease when negotiations are completed. I would ask the House to wait and not to precipitate any further ill will by intemperate language until His Majesty's Government have had a chance to interview Sir Robert Hodgson, and he has returned to Burgos to see whether it is possible to settle this business without unnecessary complications.

10.28 p.m.

Mr. Wedgwood Benn: Nobody desires to charge the hon. Member for Smethwick (Mr. Wise) or any other hon. Member with inhuman feelings, but one of the main issues of this Debate is the fate of British seamen, and one must judge the feelings of persons to some extent by the measures they propose to take to

prevent a repetition of these unhappy events. In listening to the Prime Minister I must say that it was very striking how he dealt with what is an established and acknowledged fact that day by day, week by week, British ships have been bombed. One of the captains involved in these bombings is an old Naval Reserve officer, and he has been subjected to 16 bombings. It is very strange that in dealing with this situation the Prime Minister paid particular attention, queerly enough, to what was said in the "Daily Herald," a very fine paper, to prove that some shipowner had made a fortune. Surely, the "Journal of Commerce and Shipping Telegraph," quoted by other hon. Members opposite, in support of their case, might have been used, instead of the "Daily Herald."
In the Prime Minister's treatment of the matter he seems to have taken very little account of the sufferings of the men. He said that these men had received an additional £2 for their journeys to Spain. That seems to be an offence. Reference was also made to new companies. I do not know whether that is also an offence. Whether that be so or not, those of us who have had an opportunity of talking with these merchant skippers must have been struck by the quality of the men. The captain to whom I have referred as having been bombed 12 or 14 times, has been trading with Spain all his life. He speaks Spanish and he has traded with Franco Spain and with Republican Spain. It is a matter of indifference to him with which side he trades. He trades there not so much with the desire for gain, but with obstinate British pluck he will not give up the job. When one captain was asked why he did this he said, "I have got my charter to discharge these goods and I am going to do it." I think a little more might be made of this side of the case and a little less of the large profits which the Prime Minister says these men have been making.
Then the Prime Minister went on to say that the Government are not going to be provoked into doing anything. This is what causes us to complain of the humanity of hon. Members opposite. That is not only a hint to the Japanese but those words are the death warrant of British sailors. The Prime Minister's speech the other day was immediately


followed by an intensification of this bombardment. It is a mistake to suppose that this bombardment is just an accident, that our ships are hit by accident. As a matter of fact, what is happening in Spain is an attempt to strangle Republican Spain partly by terrorism and partly by starvation. When towns have been bombed and refugees have trooped out with their small and meagre belongings they have been pursued by machine guns, as was the case in Almeria and one of the Eastern ports. It is part of the new technique that you must terrorise and break the spirit of the population, and a part of the same technique is that you must starve the population. British ships trading with Spain happen to prevent the starvation of Republican Spain, and 'planes will go on bombing our ships as long as we stand in the way of this attempt to starve the population into surrender.
What is the Prime Minister's view about this trade? He says he is going to give it no protection; he has made that very clear. Also he has said that the status of a seaman is the same as the status of a volunteer in the Spanish forces. That is an astonishing statement. The Prime Minister, as I understood, said that if you do not protect the man who volunteers for the Spanish Army why should you protect the ship which is trading with Spain? Does that mean that the Union Jack is to have no more protection than the Spanish flag from the British Government? If so, it is an astonishing doctrine, and certainly throws a little light on what is in the mind of the Government. They have not said much about it, but they hold the view that this trade with Spain, whether in coal or food, is in fact intervention. The Prime Minister, I know, does not wish to be hurried and will not even give a nod of assent, but that was the view taken by the First Lord of the Admiralty six months ago in the case of the evacuation of the refugees from Northern ports. On that occasion he said:
Help given to a beleagured garrison, either in the way of importing food or in the way of diminishing the demand for food, is military assistance.
I think that in the view of the Government this trade with Spain is in fact intervention, and certainly the Government's effort to prohibit and crush it seems to support that view. If they

take that view, then they should put coal and wheat on the schedule of munitions to Spain. That is the fair and right thing to do, and they should openly participate with Franco in the starvation of the population of Spain. That is what I think the Prime Minister dare not do. I do not think the public stomach is strong enough for that policy, which I sincerely believe to be the real policy that is being pursued. Therefore, the Prime Minister professes to examine the matter, although I understand that he thinks we ought not to help these ships. I do not know why, the day before yesterday, the right hon. Gentleman took so much trouble to examine various ways in which protection might be accorded, because he declared that he had gone through a catalogue of ways in which these ships might be protected and very reluctantly had rejected every one of them on some ground or another. Why does he do that, if he says that they ought not to go there, and if he shares the view of the First Lord of the Admiralty that the whole trade amounts to military assistance to the Spanish Government and is therefore a breach of non-intervention?
The right hon. Gentleman's first argument is that he cannot protect this shipping because it is not legal according to international law. His second argument is that the aeroplanes go so fast that it is no good shooting at them in any case. His third argument is that we cannot have a ship on every square mile of the Mediterranean. Now he says that we cannot impound General Franco's ships because he will impound our ships. I should have thought that the first thing to do was to give a warning to ships not to go to Franco's ports because they might be seized. Then, the suggestion was made from the Prime Minister's own side that anti-aircraft guns should be provided to these ships. His first answer was that he had not had much time to think about that. That is astounding.

The Prime Minister: What I said was that I had had no time in which to consider the terms of my answer.

Mr. Benn: For a year these ships have been bombed, 50 of them, and the Government have been considering the protection of them, and then when somebody


asks why should they not be given antiaircraft guns, the Prime Minister says that he has not had much time in which to think of an answer to that question. I should have thought that if it was a feasible proposition—and I believe it is—the Government would have considered it long ago. When the point was put to the Prime Minister, and he was pressed a little to give an answer as to whether he would or would not do that, his first answer was that it was a matter for the shipowners; when he was pressed further and asked whether the Government would provide them or allow it to be done, the right hon. Gentleman said, "No, I will not allow it." It comes to this, that not only will the Government not protect the ships, but it prevents the ships from protecting themselves. That is a position of degradation to which we have never previously sunk in our history.
When it is said that we should suggest ways of protecting these ships, my answer is that it is not our business to suggest definite action; what we say is that the Government, with its vast machinery of military organisation, should itself devise ways; but if any suggestion is made, there is one answer which the Prime Minister makes, and it is that with which I would like to deal. It has been said repeatedly in this Debate that to take definite action might mean war against Franco's Government. It is fantastic to suppose that action which was limited to an attack upon Franco's Government, or some sort of reprisal or seizure could possibly imperil the safety of this country or the European situation; but when the Prime Minister is pressed on that point, what he says, in a vague way, is, "Yes, but it would mean European complications." We ought really to ask the Prime Minister to make that clearer. Hon. Members on this side are just as conscious of the need for peace as hon. Members opposite, and the public of this country is passionately keen on maintaining peace. Therefore, when the Prime Minister says, "This means war," he has a very strong argument as long as people really think it is based on fact; but there comes a time when it is necessary to ask the Prime Minister to elucidate the matter a little more. He cannot elucidate the matter because he has always denied that these incidents are in any way under the control of anyone except Franco. In his arguments to-night he

assumed that these things are under the control of Franco. Therefore, if we destroyed some ship belonging to Franco, how could it imperil our relations with anybody else? The Prime Minister really leaves in our mind the feeling that he believes that another great Power would be interested.
I think that many people in all parties in this country are coming to the conclusion that it is not the fear of war that is causing the Prime Minister to pursue this policy so obstinately, but that it is the need for securing the agreement which has been outlined with Signor Mussolini. At the present time, as the "Times" Rome Correspondent says this morning, the Prime Minister enjoys the 100 per cent. confidence of the Italians. It is a very good thing to enjoy confidence and it is a very good thing to extend the area of good will if you can do it, but suppose the Italians are blackmailing us in the blood of our sailors and the Prime Minister's reputation? Supposing they say, "We will not make an agreement unless you are prepared to allow us to go on bombing your ships." Is that going to make for peace or extend the area of good will? In point of fact, though I am not qualified to make any judgment on the matter, I believe that this agreement is badly needed by the Italians at the present time. The Italians want the agreement and we could get this agreement, I believe, without sacrificing British ships. At any rate let it be made clear that many people are coming to believe that it is not true that there is a fear of European war if we exercise the ordinary police duties of protecting our nationals, and that the issue is not peace but prestige.

10.41 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Mr. Butler): In the time at my disposal it will be possible for me to deal only with the main points which have been raised in the course of this Debate. I am certain of one thing, that after the very clear and explicit statement of the Prime Minister this afternoon, it will not be necessary for me to cover the same ground as he did. Indeed I would be unable to do so—[HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear.] I am glad to find that there is, at any rate, agreement on my ability as compared with my right hon. Friend's. I wish, therefore, to pursue the


more modest course of dealing with some of the arguments which have been raised in the Debate. The right hon. Gentleman who spoke last asked that we should try to elevate this Debate on to a high plane. Let me take him at his word and examine on the highest plane the motives of those who are trading with Spain. Let me refer to the analogy made by the Prime Minister between volunteers who are ready to sacrifice their lives for the side in which they believe, and the ships which are willing to risk themselves in what they regard as legitimate trade with Spain. It was to this analogy that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Epping (Mr. Churchill) also referred.
If we consider the motives of these two classes of persons on the highest plane, as we have been asked to do, and if we remember that the Prime Minister specifically referred to those who volunteered for ambulance work and for work under the Red Cross, we find that when we say "good-bye" to them, on their departure for Spain, we admire them for their courage and tenacity of purpose. In the same way if we take the view that those who trade with Spain are trading in a legitimate way and are bringing succour in food, perhaps to the very population which the ambulance men are trying to succour in a different way, we see that there is an analogy between the two cases. I ask hon. and right hon. Gentlemen opposite whether they are unwilling in the case of the ambulance man who is killed in the course of his duty, to involve this country in the conflict, but are willing in the case of the trader, to involve this country in conflict? If we consider the matter in this way I think it will be seen that the argument of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister stands scrutiny, and that the more it is examined the more powerful it becomes. A great deal has been said about the—

Mr. S. O. Davies: rose—

Mr. Speaker: The Under-Secretary of State has a very limited time in which to reply.

Mr. Davies: Were not the analogies referred to relating to a fundamental principle? Is the ambulance man under the British flag, or is he under the flag of the side that he adopts?

Mr. Butler: My answer is that the ambulance man is under a flag that is as

noble as the British flag. A great deal has been said about the legal position to-day. The right hon. Member for Epping, in putting forward some of his powerful arguments, said that what was happening in Spain was a very grave offence, and I think my right hon. Friend who spoke earlier fully acknowledged the serious view that the Government take of this matter, and outlined the attitude which the Government are accordingly adopting and the steps which they propose to take. If I were to examine this quite simply, without becoming too legal, because, like a great many hon. Members I am not a lawyer, I should say that it could be summed up in old words that we know well. The shipowners may well say, "All things are legal," but they should say, "All things are not expedient." It may be legal to trade in Spanish waters, but after the warnings that the Government have given to shipping companies, it is certainly not expedient to go into these ports at the present time.
It has been said in the course of the Debate that British ships should be defended as sacredly as if they were British soil. That is a noble creed. Let me pursue it along the lines of common sense and quiet examination. The Government are perfectly ready, willing, and indeed able to defend our ships upon the high seas. They have said they will do so, and they will do so, but are we to accept the doctrine that, despite the warnings which we have given to British ships, any British ship, by going into territorial waters, within the three-mile limit, against the warnings which we have given and in circumstances which we cannot control, can involve this country in a struggle in which it is our policy not to intervene? That is a perfectly fair issue, and the Government answer that, in the interests of the whole country, we must adhere to the policy which we have already announced. I think this view is supported by an extract from an interview given to the "Newcastle Evening Chronicle" by a prominent shipowner in that area, who said:
The Spanish situation has been somewhat misunderstood by the general public. If a British vessel leaves international waters and goes within the three mile limit, into territorial waters, it can only expect to be attacked. They cannot claim naval protection within this limit, and they know the risks they run in doing it. Why should they shout the minute they are attacked, when


they are within the limit for the purpose of making money?
That puts the issue perfectly clearly.

Mr. David Grenfell: Do the Government accept that position?

Mr. Butler: The position is clear, that we cannot defend ships within the three mile limit. The Government position remains as it was put by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister. Now let me examine some of the remedies—

Mr. Grenfell: Have the Government to be told their rights and duties and obligations by a shipowner in the country?

Mr. Butler: I have stated the shipowners' view and the Government's view has been given by my right hon. Friend and myself on previous occasions. There is no alteration in the position. It is interesting to have different points of view on this important matter.

Mr. Alexander: Will the Government take the same view if the Spanish Government retaliate by bombing British ships in Franco harbours?

Mr. Butler: I am afraid I cannot answer a hypothetical question. I have been asked on several occasions whether we have fully examined all the remedies. One of them has been shouted, as we know, from the gallery, that social credit is the only remedy. Some of the remedies are likely to be as effective as that particular doctrine. Some of them are a great deal more dangerous. The right hon. Gentleman who opened the Debate suggested that we should blockade Palma. Let me examine that because, like so many other suggestions to which we have given close attention, it looks to the person who makes it a good idea until you examine it. But what is the logical conclusion? It would mean that the British Navy would have to institute a blockade of those islands, and would have to stop all neutral shipping. That would mean that, instead of our upholding international law, as so many hon. Members have suggested, it would be we who would become the pirates and would have to indulge in action which by the stopping and searching of neutral shipping might well ultimately involve us in a war with the Powers concerned. The more you examine any of these remedies the more you see that they are likely to involve us in a quarrel.

Sir A. Sinclair: This is a very serious matter. I wonder if the Under-Secretary will explain why the searching of neutral shipping would provoke a war when the bombing and machine gunning of British shipping does not.

Mr. Butler: Why we should be asked, in order to put right a wrong, to indulge in an obvious wrong under international law, which might have the most serious and dangerous results, I fail to see. The Government are unwilling to indulge in that particular experiment. Another experiment, which might be called a visiting-card experiment, has been suggested, by which for every ship sunk we should pay a bombing visit to Palma. That leads me to the general point raised by the right hon. Gentleman when he asked us why we were so frightened of the danger of war. If we are going to indulge in warlike action of that type, which were put forward with such ferocity by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Carnarvon Boroughs (Mr. Lloyd George) on the last occasion when we debated this question, we are bound to start a ripple which will enlarge and may eventually end in a war which we cannot control. When the Prime Minister made a declaration of foreign policy on 24th March, he warned us of the dangerous fallacy that if war once starts you can control it. History shows that you cannot. Any dangerous expedient such as that suggested by the right hon. Gentleman will, I am convinced, land us in a war the size of which we shall be quite unable to control.
Hon. Members have suggested one or two other remedies. We have had a reversion to the suggestion made by Admiral Usborne that we should take a Franco ship on every occasion. As on the previous occasion, I must remind the House and the hon. Member for the English Universities (Miss Rathbone) who raised this point, that Admiral Usborne finished his letter by saying that other considerations made the Government policy of compromise understandable, and that the proposal might be inadvisable in view of the Naval precedents that would be created. It is a pity to have recourse to quoting the Admiral without having recourse to quoting his conclusions. It shows some of the difficulties of the many suggestions which have been put forward. The right hon. Gentleman


the Member for Epping made the suggestion that we should amend the Merchant Shipping Acts. It is not for me at this short notice to give my views on the amendment of the Merchant Shipping Acts, but I think there are great difficulties in the way. At any rate, it will be examined, because all suggestions that have been put forward have received examination.
What I have said covers most of the points that have been put forward in this Debate. I can only add that the Government propose to continue the examination of certain other suggestions which have been made, for safety zones and for free ports, as I announced only two or three days ago when this matter was originally discussed. We have taken this examination a little further and we are now about to engage in discussions with the Burgos authorities on the subject of the free ports which I mentioned to the House in my previous remarks. We are also continuing with the Barcelona authorities, to whom we have sent another communication, the urgent examination of the safety zones in such a harbour as Barcelona, the diffi-

culties of which described in my previous speech.

The situation appears to be rather different from that which the right hon. Gentleman who opened the Debate described. He said that if the Labour party had been in power and had done nothing, we should have referred to the craven poltroonery of the Labour party. To-night, instead of using those terms, we can look back to one of the similes of Disraeli, when he said that it was often the habit of one political party to steal the clothes of another. Hon. Gentlemen opposite have frequently accused us of being jingoes, but I am glad to say that the party to which I belong has long since shuffled out of those clothes. It is in those clothes that the right hon. Gentleman and his friends have now dressed themselves, and we now see on the other side jingoism and pugnacity. We see on this side peace and true patriotism.

Question put, "That this House do now adjourn."

The House divided:

Tinker, J. J.
Wedgwood, Rt. Hon. J. C.
Williams, T. (Don Valley)


Tomlinson, G.
Westwood, J.
Woods, G. S. (Finsbury)


Viant, S. P.
White, H. Graham
Young, Sir R. (Newton)


Walkden, A. G.
Whiteley, W. (Blaydon)



Walker, J.
Williams, D. (Swansea, E.)
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.


Watkins, F. C.
Williams, E. J. (Ogmore)
Mr. John and Mr. Mathers.




NOES


Agnew, Lieut.-Comdr. P. G.
Despencer-Robertson, Major J. A. F.
Liddall, W. S.


Albery, Sir Irving
Donner, P. W.
Lindsay, K. M.


Allen, Lt.-Col. Sir W. J. (Armagh)
Dorman-Smith, Major Sir R. H.
Lipson, D. L.


Amery, Rt. Hon. L. C. M. S.
Drewe, C.
Llewellin, Colonel J. J.


Anstruther-Gray, W. J.
Dugdale, Captain T. L.
Lloyd, G. W.


Apsley, Lord
Duggan, H. J.
Locker-Lampson, Comdr. O. S.


Aske, Sir R. W.
Duncan, J. A. L.
Loftus, P. C.


Assheton, R.
Dunglass, Lord
Mabane, W. (Huddersfield)


Astor, Hon. W. W. (Fulham, E.)
Eastwood, J. F.
MacAndrew, Colonel Sir C. G.


Balfour, Capt. H. H. (Isle of Thanet)
Eckersley, P. T.
M'Connell, Sir J.


Balniel, Lord
Edmondson, Major Sir J.
McCorquodale, M. S.


Barclay-Harvey, Sir C. M.
Elliot, Rt. Hon. W. E.
MacDonald, Rt. Hon. M. (Ross)


Barris, Sir C. C.
Ellis, Sir G.
Macdonald, Capt. P. (Isle of Wight)


Baxter, A. Beverley
Elliston, Capt. G. S.
McEwen, Capt. J. H. F.


Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P. H.
Emery, J. F.
Maclay, Hon. J. P.


Beauchamp, Sir B. C.
Emmott, C. E. G. C.
Macnamara, Major J. R. J.


Beaumont, Hon. R. E. B. (Portsm'h)
Entwistle, Sir C. F.
Maitland, A.


Beechman, N. A.
Errington, E.
Makins, Brigadier-General Sir Ernest


Beit, Sir A. L.
Erskine-Hill, A. G.
Manningham-Buller, Sir M.


Bernays, R. H.
Evans, Capt. A. (Cardiff, S.)
Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.


Birchall, Sir J. D.
Findlay, Sir E.
Markham, S. F.


Bird, Sir R. B.
Fleming, E. L.
Mason, Lt.-Col. Hon. G. K. M.


Blair, Sir R.
Fox, Sir G. W. G.
Mayhew, Lt.-Col. J.


Blaker, Sir R.
Fremantle, Sir F. E.
Mellor, Sir R. J. (Mitcham)


Boulton, W. W.
Furness, S. N.
Mellor, Sir J. S. P. (Tamworth)


Bower, Comdr. R. T.
Fyfe, D. P. M.
Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)


Boyce, H. Leslie
Gluckstein, L. H.
Mitchell, H. (Brentford and Chiswick)


Brass, Sir W.
Glyn, Major Sir R. G. C.
Mitcheson, Sir G. G.


Briscoe, Capt. R. G.
Goldie, N. B.
Moore, Lieut.-Colonel Sir T. C. R.


Broadbridge, Sir G. T.
Gower, Sir R. V.
Moore-Brabazon, Lt.-Col. J. T. G.


Brown, Col. D. C. (Hexham)
Graham, Captain A. C. (Wirral)
Moreing, A. C.


Brown, Rt. Hon. E. (Leith)
Grant-Ferris, R.
Morgan, R. H.


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Newbury)
Granville, E. L.
Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)


Bull, B. B.
Gretton, Col. Rt. Hon. J.
Muirhead, Lt.-Col. A. J.


Bullock, Capt. M.
Gridley, Sir A. B.
Munro, P.


Burgin, Rt. Hon. E. L.
Grimston, R. V.
Neven-Spence, Major B. H. H.


Burton, Col. H. W.
Gritten, W. G. Howard
Nicholson, G. (Farnham)


Butler, R. A.
Guest, Hon. I. (Brecon and Radnor)
O'Connor, Sir Terence J.


Campbell, Sir E. T.
Guest, Maj. Hon. O. (C'mb'rw'll, N.W.)
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir Hugh


Carver, Major W. H.
Gunston, Capt. Sir D. W.
Palmer, G. E. H.


Cary, R. A.
Hambro, A. V.
Patrick, C. M.


Cayzer, Sir C. W. (City of Chester)
Hannon, Sir P. J. H.
Peaks, O.


Cazalet, Thelma (Islington, E.)
Harvey, Sir G.
Peters, Dr. S. J.


Cazalet, Capt. V. A. (Chippanham)
Haslam, Henry (Horneastle)
Pickthorn, K. W. M.


Chamberlain, Rt. Hn. N. (Edgb't'n)
Haslam, Sir J. (Bolton)
Plugge, Capt. L. F.


Channon, H.
Heilgers, Captain F. F. A.
Ponsonby, Col. C. E.


Chapman, A. (Rutherglen)
Hely-Hutchinson, M. R.
Procter, Major H. A.


Clarke, Colonel R. S. (E. Grinstead)
Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel A. P
Purbrick, R.


Clarry, Sir Reginald
Hepburn, P. G. T. Buchan-
Radford, E. A.


Clydesdale, Marquess of
Herbert, Major J. A. (Monmouth)
Raikes, H. V. A. M.


Cobb, Captain E. C. (Preston)
Herbert, Capt. Sir S. (Abbey)
Ramsay, Captain A. H. M.


Colfox, Major W. P.
Higgs, W. F.
Rankin, Sir R.


Colman, N. C. D.
Hoare, Rt. Hon. Sir S.
Rawson, Sir Cooper


Colville, Rt. Hon. John
Holmes, J. S.
Rayner, Major R. H.


Conant, Captain R. J. E.
Hopkinson, A.
Reed, A. C. (Exeter)


Cook, Sir T. R. A. M. (Norfolk N.)
Here-Belisha, Rt. Hon. L.
Reed, Sir H. S. (Aylesbury)


Cooke, J. D. (Hammersmith, S.)
Horsbrugh, Florence
Reid, Sir D. D. (Down)


Cooper, Rt. Hn. A. Duff (W'st'r S. G'gs)
Howitt, Dr. A. B.
Reid, W. Allan (Derby)


Cooper, Rt. Hn. T. M. (E'nburgh, W.)
Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hack., N.)



Courthope, Col. Rt. Hon. Sir G. L.
Hudson, Rt. Hon. R. S. (Southport)
Remer, J. R.


Cox, H. B. Trevor
Hulbert, N. J.
Rickards, G. W. (Skipton)


Cox, H. B. Trevor
Hunloke, H. P.
Robinson, J. R. (Blackpool)


Croft, Brig.-Gen. Sir H. Page
Hurd, Sir P. A.
Ross, Major Sir R. D. (Londonderry)


Crooke, Sir J. S.
Hutchinson, G. C.
Ross Taylor, W. (Woodbridge)


Crookshank, Capt. H. F. C.
lnskip, Rt. Hon. Sir T. W. H.
Rowlands, G.


Croom-Johnson, R. P.
James, Wing-Commander A. W. H.
Royds, Admiral Sir P. M. R.


Cross, R. H.
Jarvis, Sir J. J.
Russell, Sir Alexander


Crossley, A. C.
Jones, Sir G. W. H. (S'k N'w'gt'n)
Russell, S. H. M. (Darwen)


Crowder, J. F. E.
Keeling, E. H.
Salmon, Sir I.


Cruddas, Col. B.
Kerr, H. W. (Oldham)
Salt, E. W.


Culverwell, C. T.
Latham, Sir P.
Samuel, M. R. A.


Davies, Major Sir G. F. (Yeovil)
Law, Sir A. J. (High Peak)
Sandeman, Sir N. S.


Davison, Sir W. H.
Law, R. K. (Hull, S.W.)
Scott, Lord William


De la Bère, R.
Leech, Sir J. W.
Selley, H. R.


Denman, Hon. R. D.
Lees-Jones, J.
Shakespeare, G. H.


Denville, Alfred
Leighton, Major B. E. P.
Shaw, Captain W. T. (Forfar)







Shepperson, Sir E. W.
Stuart, Lord C. Crichton- (N'thw'h)
Waterhouse, Captain C.


Simmonds, O. E.
Stuart, Hon. J. (Moray and Nairn)
Watt, Major G. S. Harvie


Simon, Rt. Hon. Sir J. A.
Tasker, Sir R. I.
Wayland, Sir W. A


Smiles, Lieut.-Colonel Sir W. D.
Taylor, C. S. (Eastbourne)
Wells, Sir Sydney


Smith, Bracewell (Dulwich)
Taylor, Vice-Adm. E. A. (Padd., S.)
Whiteley, Major J. P. (Buckingham)


Smith, Sir R. W. (Aberdeen)
Titchfield, Marquess of
Wickham, Lt.-Col. E. T. R.


Smithers, Sir W.
Touche, G. C.
Williams, H. G. (Croydon, S.)


Somervell, Rt. Hon. Sir Donald
Tree, A. R. L. F.
Wilson, Lt.-Col. Sir A. T. (Hitchin)


Somerville, A. A. (Windsor)
Tufnell, Lieut.-Commander R. L.
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel C.


Southby, Commander Sir, A. R. J.
Turton, R. H.
Wise, A. R.


Spears, Brigadier-General E. L.
Wakefield, W. W.
Womersley, Sir W. J.


Spens, W. P.
Walker-Smith, Sir J.
Wood, Hon. C. I. C.


Stanley, Rt. Hon. Lord (Fylde)
Wallace, Capt. Rt. Hon. Evan
Wright, Wing-Commander J. A. C.


Stanley, Rt. Hon. Oliver (W'm'I'd)
Ward, Lieut.-Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)
Young, A. S. L. (Partick)


Stourton, Major Hon. J. J.
Ward, Irene M. B. (Wallsend)



Strauss, E. A. (Southwark, N.)
Wardlaw-Milne, Sir J. S.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Strauss, H. G. (Norwich)
Warrender, Sir V.
Captain Hope and Lieut.-Colonel Kerr.

FINANCE BILL

Again considered in Committee.

[Sir DENNIS HERBERT in the Chair.]

CLAUSE 18.—(Amendments of Schedule C and consequential amendments of Schedule D.)

Postponed Proceeding resumed on Amendment proposed, in page 12, line 40, to leave out Sub-section (8).—[Mr. Hely-Hutchinson.]

Question again proposed, "That the words proposed to be left out, to the word and,' in page 13, line 12, stand part of the Clause."

Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to.—Captain Margesson.]

Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.

GAS UNDERTAKINGS ACTS, 1920 TO 1934.

Resolved,
That the draft of a Special Order proposed to be made by the Board of Trade under the Gas Undertakings Acts, 192o to 1934, on the application of the Haslingden Union Gas Company, which was presented on the 11th day of May and published, be approved.

Resolved,
That the draft of a Special Order proposed to be made by the Board of Trade

under the Gas Undertakings Acts, 192o to 1934, on the application of the Torquay and Paignton Gas Company, which was presented on the 13th day of May and published, be approved.

Resolved,
That the draft of a Special Order proposed to be made by the Board of Trade under the Gas Undertakings Acts, 19 zo to 1934, on the application of the Reading Gas Company, which was presented on the 2nd day of June and published, be approved.

Resolved,
That the draft of a Special Order proposed to be made by the Board of Trade under the Gas Undertakings Acts, 1920 to 1934, on the application of the Tottenham and District Gas Company, which was presented on the 2nd day of June and published, be approved. "— [Mr. Cross.]

ESTIMATES.

Ordered,
That Mr. Markham be added to the Committee on Estimates. "—[Mr. James Stuart.]

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

ADJOURNMENT.

Resolved, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Captain Margesson.]

Adjourned accordingly at Fourteen Minutes after Eleven o' Clock.